m 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


GIFT  OF 


WILLIAM  OILMAN  THOMPSON. 


BY  THE  SAME   AUTHOR, 


THE    PATIENCE    OF    HOPE. 

I   volume.     i6mo.     $  i.oo. 


A    PEESENT    HEAVEN. 

ADDRESSED    TO    A    FRIEND. 
I  volume.     i6mo.     $1.00. 


In  Press. 

POEMS, 

BY   THE    SAME    AUTHOR. 


TICKNOR  AND  FIELDS,  Publishers. 


Two     FRIENDS 


BY 


THE  AUTHOR  OF  "THE  PATIENCE  OF  HOPE' 
AND    "A    PRESENT   HEAVEN" 


ET    TENEO     ET    TENEOR 


H  CM- a    RrtCTl  we  W  • 


BOSTON 
T I  C  K  N  O  R    AND     FIELDS 

1863 


AUTHOR'S    EDITION. 


UNIVERSITY    PRESS: 

WELCH,    BIGELOW,    AND    COMPANY, 

CAMBRIDGE. 


DEDICATED 


THOMAS     CONSTABLE 


BY    HIS   ATTACHED   FRIEND 


THE   AUTHOR. 


October  -jth,  1862. 


"  Meanwhile  the  gold  King  was  asking  the  man,  '  How 
many  secrets  knowest  thou?'  'Three,'  replied  the  man. 
'  Which  is  the  most  important  ? '  said  the  silver  King. 
'  The  open  one?  replied  the  other.  'Wilt  thou  open  it  to 
us  also  ? '  said  the  brass  King.  '  When  I  know  the  fourth  I ' 
replied  the  man." 

"  Have  we  not  all  one  Father?  hath  not  one  God  created 
us?  And  did  not  he  make  one?"  —  MALACHI  ii.  10,  15. 


Two    FRIENDS. 


WAS  born  beneath  quiet  hills,  among 
green  pastures,  beside  still  waters. 
My  first  companion  was  a  little 
stream,  my  earliest  counsellor  an  ancient  book. 
Along  the  edge  of  the  stream  ran  a  footpath, 
so  narrow,  so  rarely  trodden,  that  the  ferns 
and  wild-flowers  would  sometimes  overgrow 
and  even  hide  it;  and  then  the  brook  itself 
became  my  guide :  one  that  I  followed  con 
fidingly,  because  I  knew  and  loved  it  under 
every  change.  It  would  sometimes  so  contract 
the  channel  of  its  hurrying  waters  as  to  leave 
a  broad  pebbly  shingle,  warm  in  the  blaze  of 
noonday,  and  friendly  to  my  childish  feet. 
The  trees  which  fringed  it  on  either  side  would 
now  interlace  their  boughs  so  closely  that  I 


2  TWO  FRIENDS. 

could  scarcely  push  my  way  between  them, 
and  they  would  now  recede,  opening  out  some 
little  bay  of  verdure,  some  green  savanna 
which  had  been  cleared  of  its  thick  nut-bushes 
and  clinging  brambles,  and  from  whence,  through 
the  trees  that  still  held  it  in  their  arms,  one 
might  gain  a  sunny  reach  of  corn-field,  a 
glimpse  of  some  distant  village,  and  see,  be 
yond  all,  a  low  range  of  hills  that  seemed  to 
bound  the  prospect,  and  yet  to  hide,  to  promise 
nothing.  I  dwelt  long  beside  the  little  stream  ; 
so  long,  that  the  seasons  above  me  changed 
greatly,  the  dark  thunder-cloud  broke  above 
me,  the  drenching  shower  fell,  the  frost  set  in 
that  is  too  intense  to  be  searching,  when  Na 
ture's  heart  dies  within  her,  and  makes  no  sign. 
By  the  banks  of  that  little  brook,  Trouble  over 
took  me.  Pain  —  at  whose  breath  the  flowers 
paled,  the  green  leaves  shrunk  up,  and  fell  upon 
the  ground  fire-smitten  —  led  me  long  time  by 
the  hand.  Even  Anguish  met  me;  but  never 
Discord.  My  way  might  be  steep  and  unallur- 
ing  ;  but  it  was  always  plain,  "  straight  as  a  line 
could  make  it,"  and  tending  to  a  foreseen,  though 


TWO  FRIENDS.  3 

distant  end.  My  heart  was  troubled,  but  unre 
sisting  ;  so  methought  He  bringeth  thorn  to  the 
haven  where  they  would  be.  The  birds  sang  to 
me  at  morn  and  even ;  at  morn  and  even  I  read 
within  my  book.  How  was  it  that  the  brook 
suddenly  became  wider;  that  it  swelled  into  a 
mighty  river;  that  the  trees  upon  its  banks 
grew  thick  and  tangled,  and  spread  into  broad, 
untracked  woods ;  while  far  behind,  in  place  of 
the  low  hills,  that  were  but  the  plain  raised  to  a 
higher  level,  rose  mountains  with  cloven  sum 
mits,  down  which  the  clouds  stole.  They  beck 
oned  me  to  them  with  a  lure,  a  promise :  it  was 
not,  I  knew,  for  nothing  that  they  lifted  them 
selves  thus  proudly  into  heaven  ;  that  they  sank 
their  firm  foundations  so  deep  within  the  earth, 
placing  themselves  among  the  things  that  cannot 
be  shaken.  I  had  heard,  of  old,  this  saying, 
"  The  mountains  shall  bring  peace."  O  that  I 
could  reach  unto  them  !  that  I  might  gaze  from 
their  glorious  peaks !  that  I  might  delve  within 
their  unsunned  mines  !  and  I  struck  within  the 
forest  by  many  paths,  but  without  finding  that 
which  led  to  the  mountains. 


4  TWO  FRIENDS. 

One  day,  after  a  lorig  breathing  pause,  I  again 
pressed  onward.  Suddenly  parting  the  boughs, 
I  came  upon  the  ruins  of  an  ancient  temple ;  its 
white  shafts  rose  against  the  dark  forest  back 
ground,  and  still,  in  their  broken  outline,  pre 
served  the  trace  of  the  building's  original  plan, 
as  a  lovely,  once-heard  tune  will  return  upon 
the  ear  in  fragments,  and  hint  out  its  half-for 
gotten  melody.  Bright  trailing  weeds  crept  up 
these  broken  pillars.  Here  and  there  a  statue 
still  stood  erect,  —  still  breathed  with  a  divine 
impassive  life ;  and  some,  fallen  and  mutilated, 
lay  among  the  warm  grass ;  but  these,  too, 
lived;  these  too,  methought,  triumphed,  for 
their  smile  still  made  silence  eloquent.  Who 
were  these  forms  ?  the  sons  of  strength  and 
beauty,  of  light  and  freedom,  —  the  children  of 
some  golden,  untrammelled  age,  unfettered,  god 
like  ?  If  sleeping  they  could  thus  stir,  thus  en 
chain  the  soul,  what  had  they  been  in  their 
waking  ?  What  was  this  pride  upon  their  lips, 
this  calm,  this  sweetness  of  their  brows  ?  What 
had  my  life  been,  how  poor,  how  restricted,  that 
even  the  dream  of  such  forms  had  never  visited 


J 


TWO  FRIENDS.  5 

it ;  that  the  shadow  of  their  wings  had  never 
fallen  across  my  sleep,  the  bright  curve^  of  their 
half-parted  lips  never  greeted  my  waking  ?  A 
cold  gnawing  fell  upon  my  heart ;  a  scorn,  that 
was  almost  hate  of  things  familiar  and  accus 
tomed,  and  of  the  life  that  had  been  passed 
among  them.  Had  this  indeed  been  life? 

While  I  asked  myself  this  question,  music 
awoke  around  me.  I  listened :  it  was  high 
noon :  the  birds  were  silent  in  the  forest ;  the 
shattered  columns,  the  fair-gleaming  statues, 
stood  up  clear  against  the  broad  depth  of  the 
summer  heaven.  Not  a  breeze  rustled,  not  a 
leaf  shook.  Yet  around,  above,  within  me,  that 
music  gathered  ;  it  grew  stronger  in  the  silence  ; 
it  bore  me  up  as  on  mighty  wings ;  it  carried 
me  I  knew  not  whither;  in  a  moment  of  time 
it  had  taught  me  the  secret  of  a  hundred  hearts, 
—  tears  and  raptures,  despairs  and  exultations, 
too  mighty  for  one  bounded  spirit.  It  gathered 
all  things  within  it,  as  a  mother  might  draw  her 
erring,  repentant  children  unto  her  bosom ; 
making  room  for  deep  confessions,  for  recon 
ciliations  that  were  still  more  ample.  Here, 


6  TWO  FRIENDS. 

too,  were  recognitions  of  wide  relationships, 
affinities  disowned  and  slighted,  that  only  could 
meet  and  kiss  each  other  for  a  moment  while 
the  pitying  music  sobbed  above  them.  And 
still  the  strain  awoke  and  died ;  still  it  returned 
upon  itself,  as  friends,  who,  meeting  after  long 
parting,  must  again  part,  come  back  again  with 
some  word  that  can  never  be  fully  spoken.  It 
went  forth,  it  returned,  then  with  a  firm,  soft 
clasp,  as  of  a  little  child's  hand,  it  clasped  the 
spirit  closely  ;  it  held  Earth  compressed  in  a  lit 
tle  space ;  it  brought  down  Heaven  to  a  point 
of  ecstasy. 

I  fled  from  it;  I  struggled  to  regain  the 
river ;  I  forced  my  way  back  through  the  thick 
odor-breathing  trees,  through  the  wreaths,  the 
ropes  of  flowers  that  hung  from  them,  and 
sought  to  stay  me  in  their  twining  arms.  Were 
these,  too,  conspirators,  the  purple  and  scarlet 
blossoms,  that  breathed  out  their  heavy  hearts, 
full  of  anguish  and  of  love,  so  that  I  seemed,  as 
I  tore  my  way  through  them,  to  drink  in  their 
fiery  and  fragrant  souls.  —  Are  there,  I  asked, 
martyrs  among  the  flowers  ?  spirits  burning,  yet 


TWO  FRIENDS.  7 

unconsumed,  that  light  up  their  own  lives ! 
The  strife,  the  revel  of  the  music,  had  passed 
within  them  ;  they  glowed,  they  paled  with  its 
triumph  and  its  decline.  Like  moons,  they 
filled  themselves  with  light  at  its  fountain ; 
their  hues,  their  odors,  were  in  secret,  deep 
alliance  with  its  choral  mystery.  Here,  too, 
were  subtle  interfusions;  sudden,  yet  long-an 
ticipated  climaxes  of  splendor ;  discords  that 
prophesied  the  harmony  they  seemed  to  contra 
dict  ;  laws  broken,  to  be  fulfilled  in  a  deeper 
spirit.  —  At  length  I  regained  the  river,  but  not 
at  the  point  where  I  had  left  it ;  at  a  little  dis 
tance  it  lay  before  me  like  a  glittering  bow, 
flung  down  amid  the  woods  that  swept  back 
from  it  in  broad,  smooth  masses.  A  little  lower 
down,  I  saw  that  the  words  were  broken  by 
huge  masses  of  rock,  now  reddening  in  the 
westering  sun,  and  I  heard  a  hoarse  murmur, 
as  of  water,  that  chafed  within  a  narrowed 
channel ;  but  at  the  spot  where  I  now  stood, 
all  was  peace  and  loveliness.  The  river  looked 
like  a  lake,  so  broad  was  it,  so  serene,  so  un 
ruffled  ;  it  spread  its  calm  bosom  to  the  evening 


8  TWO  FRIENDS. 

sky;  the  clouds  saw  themselves  within  it  like 
islets  of  floating  flame.  It  curved  gently  to  my 
feet,  as  if  it  would  woo  me  also  to  linger. 
Peace,  peace,  it  whispered;  wilt  thou  not  also 
rest?  the  evening  bringeth  all  things  home. 

But  even  as  it  were  half  consciously  I  went 
still  onward,  and  drew  gradually  more  near  the 
rocks.  As  I  approached  still  nearer,  a  strong 
slanting  beam  from  the  red  sunset  fell  across 
them  for  a  moment,  and  I  saw  that  they  were 
scored  all  over  with  Runic  characters.  These, 
I  thought,  contain  the  history  of  some  vanished 
people,  —  some  race  passed  by,  like  a  wave  or  a 
cloud,  for  ever ;  but,  lo !  as  I  set  my  heart  to 
interpret  these  mystic  traceries,  I  found  that 
they  were  but  a  long,  unbroken  family  tradi 
tion,  the  story  of  the  Many  and  the  One,  the 
life  of  Man.  These  rocks  drew  me  to  them 
with  an  iron  magnetism;  I  lived,  I  slept  be 
neath  them ;  morn  and  even  I  pored  upon  their 
records  till  all  their  subtle  symbolism  grew  fa 
miliar  to  me,  as  to  a  child  the  pictures  upon  the 
walls  of  his  nursery.  I  stood  beside  the  cradles 
of  giant  nations ;  I  listened  to  the  songs  that 


TWO  FRIENDS.  9 

were  sung,  the  legends  that  were  told  to  races 
in  their  mighty  youth.  They  changed  often, 
yet  they  were  still  sweet,  still  intelligible ;  for 
they  were  the  same  songs  sung  by  the  same  cra- 
dle^  the  same  stories  told  beside  the  same  hearth. 
Through  them  all  ran  one  device,  as  of  two 
arrows  so  closely  bound  together  that  they 
seemed  one.  The  arrow  was  borne  onwards 
by  the  song,  the  song  sharpened  by  the  arrow ; 
each  pointed  to  an  age  far  back  in  dim  perspec 
tive,  when  gods  walked  on  earth,  and  earth  was 
worthy  of  their  footprints  ;  each  pointed,  though 
darkly,  to  a  return  of  this  period  ;  a  return  only 
to  be  achieved  through  voluntary,  self-chosen 
pain,  and  the  suffering  of  that  which  is  divine. 
Then  these  songs  of  sadness  and  of  glory 
ceased,  or  came  across  the  ear  fitfully,  as  music 
might  come  across  a  stormy  and  bitter  wave.  I 
saw  generations  of  men  crowd  and  press  upon 
each  other ;  as  the  worm  toils  beneath  the 
Southern  Ocean,  so  they  toiled  in  countless 
myriads  from  birth  even  unto  death,  building 
up  their  lives  within  the  fabric  of  some  giant 
despotism.  Behold,  what  manner  of  stones,  and 


10  TWO  FRIENDS. 

what  buildings  are  these,  and  within  them  a 
mummy  or  an  ape  in  effigy  !  Then,  as  a  mighty 
inundation  breaks  down  the  thick-woven  jungle, 
snaps  its  tall  reeds,  lays  bare  the  haunts  of  the 
wild  forest-dwellers,  and  hurries  down  to  the 
sea  with  the  lion  and  the  lamb,  the  snake  and 
the  antelope,  creatures  deadly  and  innocent, 
floating  on  its  swift  current,  hurled  to  one  com 
mon  ruin,  so  came  the  fresh  tide  of  men :  by 
land  and  by  sea  they  came  ;  swift,  compact, 
irresistible,  bearing  down  all  before  them.  I 
heard  their  wild  chants,  their  shouts  of  pride 
and  triumph : 

"  We  have  sung  them  the  Mass  of  Lances, 
It  lasted  from  morning  till  sunset. 

The  might  of  the  tempest  is  the  strength  of  the  rower, 
It  does  but  carry  us  where  we  wish  to  go." 

Yet  slowly,  from  amidst  these  wrecks,  rose  up 
the  old  foundations,  the  strongholds  of  greed 
and  cruelty ;  their  stones  were  welded  together 
firmly  as  at  the  first,  and  cemented  as  at  the 
first  with  the  sweat  of  man's  brow,  the  life- 
blood  of  his  heart.  I  saw  the  people  strong 
and  patient ;  an  ass  that  stooped  down  between 


TWO  FRIENDS.  11 

two  burdens,  accustomed  to  the  yoke  from 
youth,  yet  sometimes  striking  out  fiercely  with 
its  iron-shod  hoofs.  I  saw  the  human  heart 
made  the  football  of  tyrants,  the  plaything  of 
cruel  children,  who  knew  not  the  excellence  of 
that  with  which  they  sported.  I  saw  it  de 
frauded  both  of  its  highest  and  its  humblest 
hopes ;  cheated  alike  out  of  its  birthright  and 
its  pottage ;  sold  in  the  market-place  and  in  the 
temple ;  its  dearest  interests  set  upon  a  cast  of 
dice,  or  bartered  for  the  cold  smile  of  a  wanton. 
Yea,  more  than  this,  I  saw  a  Terror  that  had 
crept  within  the  souls  of  men.  A  divine  voice 
had  once  spoken  :  "  Fear  ye  not  them  which  kill 
the  body,  and  after  that  have  no  more  that  they 
can  do."  Shall  man  be  free  within  his  own 
spirit ;  free  to  love  and  pray,  to  call  upon  God 
in  his  own  language  ?  Here  also  shall  man  be  a 
slave ;  when  the  hunters  are  upon  him,  let  him 
not  think  to  cross  this  boundary:  it  exists  no 
longer.  Two  dark  tyrannies,  stretching  till  they 
meet,  have  taken  in  man's  whole  being.  If  he 
would  mount  up  into  heaven,  it  is  there ;  if  he 
would  lie  down  in  the  grave,  it  is  there  also : 


12  TWO  FRIENDS. 

chains,  darkness,  the  gripe  of  the  unrelenting 
bloodhound.  I  saw  a  foreground  of  desolation, 
a  background  of  abject  terror,  lit  up  with  ghastly 
fires.  I  saw  Humanity  stand  within  the  world's 
judgment-hall,  gagged,  insulted,  with  its  hands 
bound  behind  it,  the  scoff  of  Soldier  and  of 
Priest,  yet  at  that  moment  I  heard  the  voice  of 
one  that  spake,  low  but  distinct,  from  amid  the 
torture,  "Uppure  si  muove"  and  I  saw  that  the 
soul  grew.  Bound  even  with  a  band  of  brass 
and  iron,*  it  lay  yet  in  the  tender  grass  of  the 
field,  it  was  yet  wet  with  the  dew  of  heaven. 
From  time  to  time  some  heart,  within  which  the 
fire  had  long  smouldered,  would  break  and  go 
out,  it  seemed  in  ashes  and  darkness,  yet  those 
fiery  sparks  had  made  the  darkness  visible ;  no 
longer  was  it  such  as  could  be  felt.  Then  light 
arose,  but  with  it  came  confusion ;  the  heart 
was  no  longer  trampled  on,  but  it  erred,  it  was 
the  robber  of  its  own  wealth. 

Then  I  remembered  the  saying  of  the  wise 
man,  "  That  which  is  wanting  cannot  be  num 
bered."  I  thought  I  will  read  no  longer ;  these 

*  Daniel  iv.  23. 


TWO  FRIENDS.  13 

records  are  too  sorrowful ;  there  is  surely  a  less 
perplexing  lore.  I  will  seek  out  the  bipad,  lov 
ing  secret  of  the  universe ;  I  will  decipher  its 
clear  story,  not  blurred  and  defeatured  like  this 
one,  but  as  it  lies  before  me  in  the  original  hand 
writing  of  God.  But  in  this  attempt  also  was 
anguish.  When  I  flung  myself  on  Nature's 
broad  bosom  for  comfort,  its  coldness  stung  me 
like  a  thorn ;  there  was  no  warm,  tender  heart 
within  it  to  respond  to  my  own  that  beat  so 
wildly ;  its  pulsation  was  that  of  a  vast  ma 
chinery,  life  and  death  that  sprung  out  of  each 
other,  all  things  bound  in  order,  in  fatality ;  a 
Universe  that  ground  upon  its  way,  sowing  the 
Expanse  with  worlds  as  its  fiery  sparks  flew  off. 
Here  I  saw  splendor  and  desolation,  as  of  a 
magnificent  household,  lavish  in  its  expenditure, 
because  its  resources  are  illimitable.  What 
meant  these  monkeys  that  grinned  and  chat 
tered  ;  these  snakes  with  their  cold  crowns  and 
glittering  eyes ;  the  rustle  of  the  fierce  and 
lovely  leopard  ?  Also  the  flowers  put  on  a  look 
of  mockery;  their  aspects  revealed  strange  af 
finities,  awoke  suggestions  of  doubtful  import. 


14  TWO  FRIENDS. 

Were  these  house-children  also  wicked  and 
guileful?  Was  there  treachery  in  this  broad, 
universal  calm  of  Nature,  in  this  impassive  smile 
that,  sphinx-like,  told  nothing  and  hid  so  much  ? 
As  I  pursued  her  she  still  fled  before  me,  still 
flung  me  from  time  to  time,  half  derisively, 
some  intricate  toy,  a  golden  apple  that  did  but 
stay  me  from  the  final  goal.  Then,  as  if  in 
sleep  or  death,  she  would  stretch  herself  before 
me  in  a  feigned  immobility,  wrapped  in  a  thou 
sand  folds ;  and  when  I  pierced  beneath  one, 
beneath  a  hundred,  there  was  still  another 
and  another.  Were  these  swaddling-clothes 
or  grave-bands  ?  I  knew  not.  Here  I  found 
design,  I  knew  not  to  what  end ;  power ;  here 
also  bondage  more  cruel,  I  thought,  than  that 
of  men  over  their  fellows,  for  the  heart  that  has 
fallen  under  it  has  no  escape;  it  is  coextensive 
with  the  universe  itself.  I  sat  down,  a  stone 
among  the  stones ;  let  the  seasons  roll,  I  would 
grow  gray  like  them,  and  motionless.  My  eye 
wandered  listlessly  over  the  gorgeous  landscape, 
the  little  islets  of  white  sculptured  lilies,  the 
purple  woods,  the  far-distant  mountains.  Here 


TWO  FMIENDS.  15 

was  a  magnificent  panorama  of  death,  a  shining 
veil  drawn  over  a  face  that  writhed  in  anguish. 

Then,  upon  a  rock  above  me,  my  eye  lit  upon 
a  familiar  sign,  a  cross,  and  beneath  it  these 
letters, — 

"Vfs  fujjere  a  23eo,  fujje  aft  JBeum," 

and  while  I  gazed,  a  pale  majestic  face  looked 
upon  me  rebukingly ;  a  form  passed  by,  with 
kingly  but  uneven  step,  as  of  one  wounded 
even  to  death.  He  spoke  not,  but  I  read  with 
in  his  eye  this  saying,  "Faithful  are  the  wounds 
of  a  friend."  Then  I  sighed  within  my  spirit 
so  deeply  that  an  icy  band  burst;  resistance, 
rebellion,  were  gone.  The  yoke  to  which  God 
himself  had  stooped  could  not  be  too  grievous 
to  be  borne.  I  saw  this  solemn  Trinity,  Nature 
and  Man  and  God,  pierced  with  the  self-same 
wound.  I  knew  that  they  would  suffer,  I  knew 
that  they  would  be  restored  together.  Where 
was  now  the  cold  sequence,  the  crushing,  uii- 
pitying  regularity?  Let  the  worlds  roll  to 
gether,  let  the  heavens  and  the  earth  be 
changed,  Jesus,  thou,  too,  art  part  of  God's 


16  TWO  FRIENDS. 

mighty  plan!  I  sat  down  beneath  this  rock, 
not  elate,  but  satisfied;  its  broad  shadow  fell 
over  me  ;  from  beneath  it  I  gazed  upon  the 
dark  woods,  the  fair  river.  Once  again  I 
looked  up  to  that  Sign  of  love  and  triumph ; 
then  I  observed  that  it  was  green;  some  soft 
bright  lichen  had  sown  itself  within  the  deep- 
cut  symbol,  and  a  prophetic  word  fell  upon  my 
spirit :  "  The  dry  tree  shall  flourish  "  ;  the  cross 
also  shall  become  green,  shall  be  vivified  with 
the  heart  it  vivifies. 

I  arose  and  went  forward,  so  sunk  in  thought 
that  I  did  not  see  that  as  I  went  on  the  river 
shrunk  gradually  till  it  was  scarcely  broader 
than  it  had  been  in  olden  days ;  it  grew  nar 
rower  and  narrower ;  rocks  shut  it  in  on  either 
side,  sometimes  dipping  clear  into  the  water  so 
as  to  leave  no  foot-way,  sometimes  sending  out 
a  wide  stony  strand  which  seemed  to  press  the 
contracted  current  out  of  life ;  vexed  and  tor 
tured,  it  revenged  itself  by  wearing  caverns 
beneath  the  stone  where  it  whirled  in  still  black 
pools  unseen  for  ever.  The  trees,  the  flowers, 
were  left  far  behind ;  the  river  had  grown  som- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  17 

bre  and  taciturn.  O,  how  I  missed  its  early 
cheerfulness,  the  nut  and  alder  busies  that 
overhung  its  banks ;  the  scarlet  berry  of  the 
mountain-ash  in  autumn,  the  white  stain  of  the 
wild  cherry-tree  in  spring  ;  the  leap  of  the  trout, 
the  glimmer  of  the  dragon-fly,  the  brown  wet 
shine  of  the  smooth  stones  beneath  the  stream. 
I  thought  of  the  unequal  stepping-stones,  invit 
ing  to  a  perilous  joy ;  .the  frequent  bridge, 
rustic  and  tremulous,  upon  which  it  was  so 

sweet  to  linger,  to  cross  and   recross   without 
&    > 

any  stringent  motive.  Then  the  little  brook  had 
been  companionable,  garrulous ;  it  chode,  it 
murmured  incessantly,  yet  said  nothing ;  it  did 
not  need  to  speak  articulately,  for  it  was  in 
accordance  with  all  that  surrounded  it.  What 
need  for  speech  or  language  where  a  Voice  was 
ever  heard  ? 

Then,  too,  I  had  had  many  companions,  play 
mates,  and  work-fellows,  whose  looks,  whose 
voices  had  been  dearer  to  me  than  aught  by  the 
brook  or  in  the  forest.  Sometimes  we  had  read 
together  in  the  book ;  sometimes  we  had  knelt 
and  prayed  together  in  the  clear  evening  light. 


18  TWO  FRIENDS. 

We  loved  each  other  ;  we  shared  together  many 
innocent  secrets,  many  joys  and  tears,  many 
thoughts  that  we  passed,  as  in  a  torch-race, 
from  hand  to  hand ;  the  light  that  dawned  upon 
one  heart  would  grow  to-day  in  another.  I 
thought  it  would  be  thus  for  ever.  Had  these 
deserted  me,  or  had  I  left  them,  ever  following 
the  course  of  this  mysterious  river?  Their 
voices  sounded  clear  and  cold,  like  distant  bells, 
tender  only  through  some  long-past  association. 
Even  those  of  my  beloved  Dead  were  nearer ; 
but  these,  too,  had  grown  thin  as  the  music  of 
the  wind-swept  pine-tree.  I  knew  that  I  was 
now  alone.  I  could  not  reunite  these  ties ;  I 
could  not  bring  back  the  Past,  which  had  gone 
for  ever.  It  was  not  night  within  my  soul,  for 
neither  moon  nor  stars  appeared ;  no  soft  lure 
held  me  back ;  no  bright,  unsteadfast  hope 
urged  me  forward.  Neither  found  I  the  black 
ness  of  darkness  within  my  spirit,  but  a  strange 
freedom,  joined  with  a  loneliness  that  was 
almost  fearful.  Around,  within  me  was  calm, 
and  silence  that  spread  and  stretched  like  the 
desert,  ever  widening,  to  widen  ever;  a  grave 


TWO  FRIENDS.  19 

that  was  shut  in  by  no  bars.  "  Free,"  I  said, 
44  among  the  dead."  Like  one  continually  as 
cending,  I  had  left  the  pale  saxifrage,  the  last 
flower  that  fringes  the  verge  of  ice,  behind  me. 
The  air  grew  keen  and  difficult.  Every  step 
revealed  some  fresh  undreamt-of  glory,  some 
rose-flushed  summit,  some  meeting-ground  of 
earth  and  heaven ;  but  it  was  chill ;  I  drew  my 
breath  with  pain ;  my  heart  seemed  to  have 
ceased  beating,  but  when  I  laid  my  hand  upon 
it,  I  found  that  it  burned  with  self-fed,  self- 
centred  fire. 

Then,  suddenly,  there  fell  upon  my  soul  a 
sense  of  greatness,  telling  me  to  be  no  more 
sorrowful,  for  that  I  was  not  really  alone,  but 
part  of  a  Whole  in  which  I  should  find  all 
things,  —  those  that  I  had  left  behind,  those 
that  I  had  failed  to  reach  to,  yea,  my  own  life 
also.  If  it  be  indeed  so,  I  thought,  then  I  re 
fuse  not  to  die ;  to  lose  that  which  is  in  part,  in 
the  coming  in  of  that  which  is  perfect.  But 
how  may  my  spirit  attain  unto  this  baptism? 
Oftentimes  I  seemed  near  some  mighty  secret, 
to  lie  on  the  very  threshold  of  Truth ;  but  to  be 


20  TWO  FRIENDS. 

chained  there :  a  spell  was  upon  that  threshold 
that  never  allowed  me  to  overpass  it.  On  the 
flower,  the  shell,  the  wing  of  the  butterfly, 
were  traces  of  a  writing  whose  counterpart  was 
in  my  own  soul ;  as  when  a  page  has  been  torn 
down  the  midst,  I  found  I  had  only  to  join  these 
characters  to  make  their  meaning  plain.  The 
winds,  the  leaves,  my  own  voice  and  that  of  the 
birds,  were  harmony ;  I  strove  to  master  it ;  to 
pierce  to  its  deep  fundamental  structure.  Then 
the  rocks  began  to  give  forth  music  at  sunrise 
and  sunset ;  not  like  that  alluring,  bewildering 
music  of  the  forest  and  ruined  temple,  but  sol 
emn  and  chastened.  That  sweetness  dissolved 
the  spirit ;  this  built  it  up  within  its  mighty 
chord.  Each  scattered  drop,  each  bright  spark 
of  melody  that  had  fallen  here  and  there,  mak 
ing  some  stray  blade  or  blossom  lovely,  shone 
there,  gathered  up  into  a  lofty  arch  of  sound 
that  might  grow,  I  thought,  to  one  of  Triumph, 
spanning  earth  and  heaven.  It  was  ever  pure, 
ever  prophetic  ;  yet  now,  as  I  listened,  it  seemed 
to  me  that  there  were  but  two  who  spake  within 
it,  exchanging,  as  in  some  old,  simple  song,  the 


TWO  FRIENDS.  21 

J  and  Thou  of  an  unalterable  constancy ;  then 
it  would  grow  to  the  voice  of  a  great- multitude, 
to  the  sound  of  many  waters.  I  heard  harpers 
harping  on  their  harps,  compassing  me  about 
with  songs  of  deliverance ;  and  yet  the  music 
did  not  change. 

For  hours  I  would  lie  listening  to  the  birds ; 
for  hours  I  would  toil  among  the  flowers  and 
fossils  I  had  collected ;  once  more  I  read  at 
morn  and  even  in  my  book.  Then  as  I  lay  at 
midday,  a  light  above  the  brightness  of  the 
noon  would  sometimes  be  cast  around  me,  and 
a  well-known  Form  would  pass  me,  as  one  in 
haste.  His  step  was  still  regal;  his  garments 
red,  from  the  battle  or  the  vintage,  I  knew  not 
which  ;  but  his  eye  was  calm  as  that  of  one  who 
follows  out  some  vast,  long-deliberated  plan. 
He  did  not  stay  to  speak  with  me,  but  in  pass 
ing  me  his  step  was  slower,  and  once  he  turned 
and  looked  upon  me  for  a  moment.  I  under 
stood  that  silent  appeal,  yet  I  did  not  respond 
to  it,  did  not  follow  where  it  led.  I  had  ex 
perienced,  endured  so  much  ;  weariness  of  all 
things,  even  of  good,  had  overtaken  me ;  a 


22  TWO  FRIENDS. 

spring  in  my  life  that  kept  all  moving  had  run 
low,  had  stopped  altogether.  Then  understood 
I  why  a  certain  Father  had  said,  "  I  have  writ 
ten  unto  you,  young  men,  because  ye  are  strong" 
Even  now,  far  above  the  valley,  I  heard  the 
clear  songs  of  the  vintagers,  the  shouts  of  those 
who  carried  home  the  corn  ;  the  fields  stood 
white,  all  things  told  me  that  the  Harvest  of 
the  earth  had  come,  and  its  Lord  would  imme 
diately  thrust  in  the  sickle.  How  gladly  would 
I  once  have  joined  these  bands,  have  shared  in 
their  labors,  their  rewards !  I  thought  of  the 
plans  I  had  formed  with  my  old  play-fellows, 
how  we  would  clear  jungles,  would  found  villa 
ges  ;  now  I  had  ceased  to  plan,  perhaps  because 
I  had  ceased  to  hope.  How,  too,  could  I  leave 
this  world  so  lately  found,  so  hardly  won ;  too 
late  I  loved  thee,  thou  fair,  ever-changing  realm 
of  Nature  !  This  high  rock-girdled  paradise  of 
thought  and  beauty,  this  citadel  of  refuge,  this 
green  enclosure,  —  is  it  not  a  little  one?  passed 
by  by  the  busy  foot,  overlooked  by  the  curious 
eye,  fair  only  to  the  heart  that  loves  it,  yet  hard 
to  leave.  I  know  thee,  Jesus,  that  thou  art  an 


TWO  FRIENDS.  23 

hard  man,  reaping  where  thou  hast  not  sown, 
gathering  where  thou  hast  not  strawed.  I 
remembered  one  who  had  gone  away  sorrowful 
because  he  had  a  small  possession,  and  I  felt  that 
the  full  hand  has  the  loosest  grasp.  The  with 
ered  tendrils  cling  closer  than  the  green ;  when 
the  rose  was  yet  heavy  with  dew,  and  fragrance,, 
it  had  not  been  so  hard  to  pluck  it  off! 

And  that  benignant  form  still  passed  upon  his 
way,  still  looked  upon  me  in  sadness,  but  with 
out  austerity.  Jesus,  thou  knowest  the  heart, 
but  thou  art  greater  than  our  heart,  and  know 
est  all  things !  The  Poor  committeth  himself 
unto  Thee. 

One  day  I  had  turned  aside  to  track  the 
course  of  a  little  brawling  stream  that  fell  into 
the  river ;  its  waters  were  of  a  clear  golden 
brown,  like  that  of  the  dying  fern ;  it  had  come 
across  many  a  lonely  moor  from  the  mountains, 
and  might,  I  thought,  take  me  with  it  to  its 
birthplace.  First,  however,  it  led  me  into  a 
still  gray  valley,  strewn  with  pieces  of  rock, 
that  looked  at  a  little  distance  like  a  flock  of 
sheep  feeding,  and  added  to  the  peaceful  charm 


24  TWO  FRIENDS. 

of  the  scene.  All  breathed  security.  I  wan 
dered  to  and  fro  without  much  thought;  I 
threw  myself  upon  the  warm  grass,  resting  my 
head  upon  one  of  the  gray  stones.  It  was  Au 
tumn,  one  of  those  days  that  are  sweeter,  kinder 
than  the  Spring.  The  wind  hlew  strong,  yet 
softly ;  it  wakened  I  know  not  what  echoes 
among  the  rocks,  the  mountains,  yet  within  the 
valley  all  was  still ;  the  birches  that  hung  from 
its  rocky  sides  scarcely  shook ;  only  from  time 
to  time  a  thrill  as  of  pleasure  passed  through 
them.  Often  have  I  listened  to  the  wind  with 
rapture,  but  never  did  it  bear  to  me  so  full,  so 
rich  a  message,  one  of  unspeakable  tranquillity, 
and  hope  so  calm,  that  I  knew  not  whether  this 
voice  came  to  me  out  of  the  past  or  out  of  the 
future  ;  all  that  was  sweet,  was  desired  in  either, 
seemed  to  mingle  in  it.  Can  ecstasy,  I  thought, 
wear  such  sober  colors  ?  A  Hand  seemed  to 
guide  that  rushing  wind  ;  it  fell  upon  my  cheek, 
my  forehead,  like  a  blessing  warm  from  some 
heart  of  more  than  human  tenderness.  Then 
my  own  heart  stirred  and  fluttered  beneath  that 
brooding  warmth,  and  from  its  very  depths  two 


TWO  FRIENDS.  25 

words  went  up,  u  Our  Father,"  and  I  knew 
that  I  had  found  the  long-sought  key,  the  pure, 
primeval  language.  This  then  was  what  I 
sought,  what  I  needed,  a  Father  who  was  a 
Spirit,  the  Father  of  Spirits  and  of  men.  Had 
he  indeed  come  forth  to  meet  me  f  Then  I  knew 
that  I  was  not  far  from  home. 

"  I  shall  rest,"  I  said,  "  beneath  His  wings, 
and  I  shall  be  safe  among  His  feathers."  A 
calm  of  feeling  fell  upon  me,  such  as  is  wont  to 
precede  the  great  crises  of  life,  when  the  soul, 
feeling  itself  upon  the  very  threshold  of  a  new 
existence,  is  held  back  there  by  the  old  one, 
which,  before  it  is  left  behind  forever,  has 
many  things  to  say,  and  concentrates  its  spirit 
within  a  few  solemn  moments :  — 

"  Last  night  I  saw  the  new  moon, 
With  the  old  moon  in  her  arms." 

There  are  some  days,  even  moments,  in  our 
lives,  upon  which  the  burden  of  the  whole  seems 
laid,  which,  as  in  a  parable,  condense  within 
them  the  mystery,  the  contradiction  of  our  ex 
istence,  and  perhaps  hint  at  its  solution.  After 
such  times,  life  grows  clearer  before  and  after. 
2 


26  TWO  FRIENDS. 

These  seasons  are  set  apart  from  the  rest  by  a 
solemn  consecration.  We  feel  that  we  are 
anointed  "  above  our  fellows  " ;  it  may  be  for 
the  joy  of  the  bridal,  for  the  wrestler's  strug 
gle,  or  against  the  day  of  our  burial,  we  know 
not  which. 

The  mountain  stream  had  become  a  friend  to 
me ;  its  voice  reminded  me  of  that  of  my  earli 
est  companion,  the  brook,  in  the  days  when  we 
had  been  young  together.  The  noon  drew  to 
its  decline,  filling  the  glen  with  a  calm  golden 
light,  that,  meeting  with  its  own  lustre  on  the 
fading  leaves,  kindled  them  into  a  sudden  radi 
ance.  I  followed  the  stream  slowly,  when,  as  it 
were,  in  a  moment,  it  ended,  and  the  valley 
with  it.  It  was  as  if  the  craggy,  woody  ledge 
of  a  mountain  had  slipt  forward,  and  brought 
the  scene  to  a  close  so  abruptly  that  one  might 
think  there  was  nothing  beyond,  and  that  the 
world  itself  ended  here.  Yet  the  stream  gave 
this  thought  a  joyous  contradiction  as  it  fell 
from  height  to  height,  flashing  lightly  between 
the  bushes  that  half  hid  it,  and  gathering  itself 
at  the  foot  of  the  rock  into  a  deep  unsunned 


TWO  FRIENDS.  27 

pool.  Looking  closer,  too,  I  saw  a  steep  path, 
by  which  an  agile  climber  might  wend* his  way 
up  the  rock  without  much  difficulty ;  but  I  at 
that  moment  felt  in  no  mood  for  adventure.  I 
stood  long,  half  listening  to  the  falling  water, 
half  gazing  at  the  singular,  enchanting  scene ; 
when  far  above  me  I  heard  a  clear,  low  whistle, 
and,  looking  up,  saw  the  brown,  handsome  face 
of  one  who  bent  over  the  crag,  and  nodded  to 
me,  as  if  in  recognition. 

I  smiled  in  return,  for  the  loneliness  drew  us 
together  like  a  band. 

He  called  to  me,  "  Shall  I  show  you  the  up 
ward  path  ?  "  I  shook  my  head  ;  so,  half  leaping 
from  point  to  point,  half  swinging  himself  from 
bough  to  bough,  using  both  feet  and  hands 
freely,  he  let  himself  down  the  rock,  and  soon 
reached  the  place  where  I  was  standing.  Then 
I  saw  that  his  dress  was  plain,  even  to  homeli 
ness,  yet  his  air  was  free  and  noble ;  he  set  his 
foot  firmly  on  the  ground,  as  one  who  found  his 
place  wherever  he  happened  to  stand.  In  all 
his  movements  there  was  a  decision,  a  rapidity, 
that  made,  as  it  were,  a  wind  that  carried  him 


28  TWO  FRIENDS. 

forward;  a  light,  pleasant  rustling,  a  joyous 
excitement,  as  of  the  chase  or  the  voyage, 
seemed  to  follow  where  he  went.  But  did  I 
see  this  at  first !  did  I  see  anything  in  thee  at 
first  and  at  last  but  thy  kindness,  Philip  !  From 
the  first  unto  the  last  thou  wert  unto  me  a 
friend  ;  one  that  showed  himself  friendly. 

He  saw  that  I  looked  wearied,  and  offered 
me  a  cordial  from  a  flask  that  he  carried  with 
him.  As  he  poured  it  out,  the  wind  blew  aside 
his  vest,  and  I  saw  that  he  carried  within  his 
bosom  the  book  that  had  so  long  been  my  com 
panion.  We  sat  together  on  the  trunk  of  a 
fallen  tree ;  we  talked  till  the  shadows  began  to 
gather  round  us  thickly.  The  dying  light,  the 
faint  shiver  of  the  leaves  above  us,  the  mystery, 
the  solitude  that  enclosed  us,  —  all  seemed  to 
exalt,  to  deepen  our  converse,  to  shorten  our 
way  into  each  other's  hearts,  by  removing  all 
that  ofttimes  drops  like  a  veil  between  soul  and 
soul,  changing  us  from  our  truer,  better  selves 
in  an  evil  transfiguration.  But  had  I  met  thee, 
Philip,  in  the  thick  of  this  world's  conventions, 
even  there,  even  at  first  meeting,  we  had  made 


TWO  FRIENDS.  29 

for  ourselves  a  solitude,  like  this  one,  populous 
with  thought. 

I  asked  him  many  questions  about  the  moun 
tains,  about  the  broad  plains  of  toil  and  conflict 
that  spread  below  them,  on  which  I  found  he 
was  a  dweller.  Then,  in  return,  he  inquired 
eagerly  into  the  secrets  of  the  broad  river,  the 
rocks,  the  forest.  I  found  they  were  not  un 
known  ground  to  him,  though  their  spells  had 
never  laid  so  strong  a  grasp  on  his  spirit  as  on 
mine.  "  For  I,"  he  said,  smiling,  "  came  not  in 
by  the  Gate  which  is  called  Beautiful."  He 
examined  my  store  of  specimens  with  eager 
curiosity.  My  own  spirit  caught  the  flame, 
each  withered  flower  seemed  to  bloom,  each 
pebble  to  flash  like  an  opal,  as  I  spread  them 
forth  before  him.  They  had  never  before 
seemed  so  valuable  to  me,  yet  I  exclaimed,  with 
a  hasty  impulse,  "  Take  any  of  them,  all ;  you 
will  use,  enjoy  them ;  I  perhaps  have  done 
neither/' 

"  Nay,"  he  returned,  laughing,  "  the  best 
things  are  those  which  are  shared,  not  given. 
I  will  take  nothing  from  you ;  for  a  gift  de- 


30 


TWO  FRIENDS. 


mands  a  gift  in  return,  and  what  have  I  to  give 
you  in  exchange  ?     Nothing." 

"  Nothing,"  I  answered  him,  "  except  that 
which  is  the  fibre  and  soul  of  all  things,  — 
Hope." 

"  Well,  then,"  he  said,  looking  at  me  with 
his  clear,  honest  eyes,  "I  will  make  a  good 
bargain,  and  traffic  with  that  against  your 
wisdom." 

I  laughed  in  my  turn,  and  said,  "Agreed, 
if  you  will  exchange  that  word  for  my  expe 
rience." 

,  eyjjerfence  toorfcetj)  Jwpe." 


T  was  in  Autumn  that  I  first  met 
Philip,  and  with  Autumn,  and  all 
that  belongs  to  it,  he  is  forever 
associated  to  my  mind;  with  walks  through 
the  rustling  corn-fields,  across  the  breezy, 
sunny  hills;  with  rambles  in  the  woods,  the 
faint  decaying  odor  of  the  fallen  leaves,  and 
the  sound  of  our  footsteps  among  them ;  with 
ripe  nuts  slipping  from  their  husks;  with  the 
berry,  the  fir-apple,  the  acorn ;  with  all  that 
makes  up  Autumn's  sober,  exhilarating  charm. 
And  yet,  more  than  with  all  of  this,  I  connect 
him  with  that  sense  of  rest  and  fulfilment,  "  the 
joy  of  harvest,"  which  only  Autumn  brings. 
How  bright,  how  confident  was  Philip !  Yet 
his  was  a  sober,  I  had  almost  said  a  calculated 
joy ;  it  held  by  a  firm  root,  being  not  so  much 


32  TWO  FRIENDS. 

a  part  of  his  nature  as  belonging  to  the  whole 
of  it.  As  we  now  stood  together,  I  saw  that  I 
was  not  so  much  older  than  he  as  I  had  at  first 
imagined  ;  no,  nor  yet  so  much  poorer ;  but  his 
spoils  had  been  won  in  the  free  sunlight,  mine 
gathered  from  the  darksome  cave.  What  mat 
ter  that  they  had  been  won  hardly,  even 
snatched  from  dark  and  slippery  places,  where 
my  footing  had  wellnigh  failed?  what  matter 
that  they  had  now  ceased  to  charm  me  ?  that  I 
delight  no  longer  in  the  dark  glow  of  the  car 
buncle,  in  the  opal's  imprisoned  fire  ?  for  thou, 
Philip,  didst  love  and  prize  them,  and  they  may 
serve  thee  for  use  and  beauty  when  thy  friend 
is  here  no  longer. 

Philip,  too,  had  been,  like  me,  a  merchant 
man  seeking  goodly  pearls.  Beauty,  knowl 
edge,  power,  had  each  cast  its  deep  spell  over 
his  spirit ;  his  toils  had  been  as  severe  as  mine, 
yet  mixed  with  far  less  of  suffering,  and  this 
because  he  had  ever  been  at  home  in  the  world. 
Growing  as  the  tree,  as  the  flower  grows,  from 
within,  yet  drinking  freely,  as  they  do,  of  air 
and  dew  and  sunshine,  for  him,  as  regards  each 


TWO  FRIENDS.  33 

common,  kindly  outward  influence,  had  that 
word  been  spoken,  "  Unto  you  are  they  given 
for  food"  My  life  had  been  more  restrained, 
less  natural;  it  would  sometimes  seem  to  me 
that  I  formed  no  essential  part  of  the  things 
that  surrounded  me,  that  I  even  lived  by  effort 
and  volition.  Yet  this  secret  sense  of  unfamil- 
iarity  sat  heavily  on  my  spirit ;  I  had  been  like 
a  stranger  with  a  friendly  heart,  who,  perplexed 
with  the  bustle  of  the  family,  smiles  and  tries  to 
look  as  if  he  understands  what  it  all  means. 
Even  when  I  had  been  most  bewildered  by  the 
rush  and  clatter  of  the  vast  machinery  of  life, 
with  its,  to  me,  unintelligible  wheels  and 
springs,  I  had  the  most  striven  to  knit  myself 
up  within  the  complicated  web  it  wrought.  I 
had  sought  to  find  for  myself  affinities  which 
even  in  courting  I  had  in  some  degree  dreaded, 
for  it  was  need  rather  than  affection  that  drew 
me  to  them,  and  I  knew  not  how  dangerously 
powerful  such  alliances  might  prove ;  they  re 
turned  my  grasp  closely,  but  was  their  pressure 
indeed  kindly  ?  Often  I  felt  the  steel  gauntlet 
rather  than  the  living  hand.  Might  they  not 

2*  C 


34  TWO  FRIENDS. 

absorb  the  life  they  seemed  to  nourish?  Yet 
while  I  had  now  wound  myself  round  a  shelter 
ing  elm,  while  I  had  now  been  driven  to  em 
brace  the  rock  for  a  shelter,  while  I  had  been 
ever  solicitous  of  some  exterior  help,  some  but 
tress  that  might  support  the  fabric  it  seemed  but 
to  adorn,  Philip's  mind  resting  on  a  sure  foun 
dation,  and  tending  to  a  fixed  aim,  had  lifted  up 
his  whole  life  into  the  sunshine,  self-poised,  like 
the  dome  of  Brunelleschi.  His  whole  spiritual 
being  was  like  a  strongly-governed  country, 
where  all  things  fall,  as  it  were,  inevitably  un 
der  a  few  fixed  all-inclusive  laws  ;  the  problems 
of  life  and  thought  perplexed,  but  did  not  over 
whelm  him ;  the  enchanted  forest  of  fancy  was 
safe  ground  to  one  who  held  within  his  bosom 
the  golden  knife,  ever  ready  to  cut  its  clear, 
swift  way,  when  the  path  became  too  en 
tangled,  the  knot  too  hard. 

Yet  Philip  was  no  special  pleader  even  for 
Truth  itself;  he  loved  her  for  her  own  sake, 
too  well  to  ask  her  "whence  she  came,  or 
whither  she  was  going  " ;  he  held  her,  I  often 
thought,  in  a  bold,  loving  clasp,  as  the  maiden 


TWO  FRIENDS.  35 

is  held  in  the  ancient  legend :  let  her  turn 
within  his  arms  to  sword  or  flame,"  let  her 
change  there  into  some  fearful  and  monstrous 
shape,  still  would  that  fervent,  unrelaxing  grasp 
compel  her  to  reveal  herself  in  her  true  like 
ness  ;  still  within  those  very  arms  would  she 
bless  him.  He  knew  that  she  would  ofttimes 
make  herself  strange  to  him,  and  lead  him 
through  crooked  paths ;  and  where  she  led,  he 
followed.  He  avoided  no  discussion  ;  he  shrank 
from  no  conclusion ;  yet  it  was  interesting 
through  all  to  watch  his  quiet,  assured  counte 
nance,  bright,  I  sometimes  thought,  with  a  sort 
of  patient,  anticipated  triumph,  like  that  of  one 
to  whom  the  end  has  been  made  surely  known, 
though  he  has  been  left  to  find  for  himself  the 
way.  Duty,  faith,  accountability  —  all  that  the 
clear  consciousness  of  spiritual  freedom  gives  — 
were  so  strong  in  him  as  to  determine  the  grav 
itation  of  his  intellect,  as  well  as  that  of  his 
soul.  To  steadfast,  implicit  reliance  on  God, 
to  simple,  practical  obedience  to  His  law,  he 
must  come  back  after  however  strong  and  dar 
ing  a  flight.  Therefore  he,  of  all  whom  I  have 


36  TWO  FRIENDS. 

known,  was  best  able  to  realize  the  evangelic 
privilege  of  serving  the  Lord  without  fear.  Let 
him  wander  where  he  would,  he  could  not  get 
into  a  Far  Country;  the  world  was  unto  him 
the  Father's  house,  and  he  the  Son  who  was 
ever  with  him.  His  spirit  was  that  of  one  to 
whom  the  day  of  life,  from  dawn  to  dusk,  was 
emphatically  the  Day  after  which  the  Night 
cometh,  wherein  no  man  can  work;  and  yet 
there  was  in  him  I  know  not  what  sweetness 
and  candor  of  nature,  that  saved  him  from  the 
narrowness  that  so  often  marks  the  compact, 
established  mind.  He  was  no  slave  of  the 
Hours,  to  lie  upon  the  grass  and  watch  their 
flight,  as  it  is  marked  by  sun-gleam  and  shadow, 
by  the  opening  and  the  closing  flower.  Yet 
each  station  of  the  day,  each  spot  where  the 
chariot  of  the  sun  rested,  was  dear  to  him :  sun 
rise,  evening,  the  broad  golden  noon,  the  bird's 
clear  song,  the  sudden  scent  of  bud  and  bough, 
the  spring's  overcoming  rapture,  —  these  might 
not  tempt  thee,  Philip,  to  linger  on  thy  way, 
yet  which  of  them  didst  thou  ever  miss? 
Often,  it  is  true,  I  would  accuse  him,  half 


TWO  FRIENDS.  37 

playfully,  yet  half  seriously,  of  utilitarianism, 
in  a  wider  field  than  that  commonly* assigned 
to  it,  yet  utilitarianism  still.  "  You  love,"  I 
would  say,  "  many  things  beautiful  and  excel 
lent,  not  for  their  own  sakes,  but  because  they 
help  and  cheer  you  to  a  higher  aim." 

"And  I,"  said  Philip,  "shall  not  be  too 
careful  to  defend  myself  from  that  charge,  or 
from  the  kindred  one  which  you  brought 
against  me  not  many  hours  ago.  When  I  lis 
tened  so  fixedly  to  your  Scandinavian  legend, 
I  was,  as  you  suspected,  thinking  of  my  Young 
Men's  class,  and  of  'improving'  it  for  their 
benefit  when  we  meet  this  evening.  But  did 
this  make  me  feel  and  enjoy  its  beauty  less? 
I  do  not  share  Schiller's  jealousy  about  making 
the  Ideal  useful;  let  her  be  so,  when  and  as 
she  pleases.  She  will  not,  it  is  true,  toil  or 
spin ;  she  will  not  grind  at  the  mill  for  any 
man ;  she  will  not  be  the  wife  of  his  bosom, 
his  housemate  and  helpmeet,  not  even  his 
steady,  reliable  friend.  And  yet  does  it  not 
show  how  great  Man's  spirit  is,  that  he  should 
have  needs  to  which  none  but  this  fair,  proud 


38  TWO  FRIENDS. 

Queen  can  minister,  weariness  which  she 
alone  can  soothe,  griefs  which  only  she  can 
solace?  There  is  a  region  within  him  in 
which  she  also  serves,  and  serves  no  less  truly 
because  her  action  is,  like  that  of  all  spiritual 
forces,  irregular  and  intermittent,  —  an  influence 
which  comes  unwooed,  and  departs  unbidden, 
no  more  to  be  trained  and  disciplined  than 
the  lightning  can  be  steadied  into  the  fire  of  a 
household  hearth,  to  live  by  and  cook  by.  I 
have  long  loved  art  and  poetry,  because  I  saw 
that  they  had  a  power  to  raise  and  soften  Hu 
manity  ;  more  lately  I  have  seen  that  they  are 
good  in  themselves,  —  or  whence,  but  from  their 
native  affinity  with  the  things  that  are  more 
excellent,  should  come  this  acknowledged  pow 
er?  Why,  when  the  heart  would  reveal  its 
truest,  deepest  instincts,  does  it  seek  to  express 
itself  in  music  ?  Why,  when  the  mind  would 
utter  forth  words  of  nobleness,  —  when  it  would 
be  truer  and  sweeter  than  it  can  be  under  its 
ordinary  conditions,  does  it  speak  in  poetry? 
Could  there  be  a  prose  psalm?" 
"  Even  in  dancing,"  I  said,  "  there  seems  to 


TWO  FRIENDS.  39 

be  something  of  this  desire  to  escape  into  the 
region  you  speak  of,  one  less  fettered,  but  more 
ordered  than  that  in  which  we  ordinarily  move. 
A  subtle  charm  lies  in  the  apparent  freedom 
of  the  movement,  and  the  sense  of  its  being 
bound  to  the  music ;  a  pleasure  akin  to  that 
which  music  itself  gives  us,  in  the  knowledge 
that  it  must  fall  back  upon  an  inevitable,  rigor 
ous  law;  its  free,  proud  changes  are  like  the 
movements  of  a  queen  in  captivity.  The  mind 
loves  to  feel  itself  under  a  harmonious  neces 
sity, 

'  Breaking  its  order,  yet  still  to  that  order  returning, 
Changing  and  winding,  yet  true  to  its  Measure  and  Law.' 

And  in  obeying  this  it  attains  a  double  eman 
cipation,  for  in  confusion  there  is  ever  bond 
age;  and  it  is  to  this  confusion,  the  want  of 
rhythm  and  cadence  in  life,  the  absence  of  a 
clear  purpose  and  intention,  that  it  owes  so 
much  of  its  weariness  and  sadness.  Have  you 
not  felt  how  much  there  is  in  the  ordinary 
inevitable  course  of  life  which  genders  to  bond 
age  ?  '  The  strong  hours  conquer  us.'  We 
are  straitened  in  ourselves  and  in  each  other, 


40  TWO  FRIENDS. 

fettered  to  a  routine  which  makes  us  often  say, 
with  John  Bunyan,  '  And  so  I  went  home  to 
prison.' " 

"  And  this,  as  you  say,  is  inevitable ;  we 
blame  society  for  being  constrained  and  arti 
ficial,  but  its  conventionalities  are  only  the 
result  of  the  limitations  of  man's  own  nature. 
How  much,  for  instance,  of  what  is  called  '  re 
serve'  belongs  to  this  life,  and  passes  away  with 
its  waning,  and  the  waxing  of  the  new  life ! 
We  can  say  to  the  dying,  and  hear  from  them, 
things  that,  in  the  fulness  of  health  and  vigor, 
could  not  be  imparted  without  violence  to  some 
inward  instinct.  And  this  is  one  reason,  among 
many  others,  why  it  is  so  good  to  be  in  the 
house  of  mourning,  the  chamber  of  death.  It 
is  there  more  easy  to  be  natural,  —  to  be  true, 
I  mean,  to  that  which  is  deepest  within  us.  Is 
there  not  something  in  the  daily,  familiar  course 
of  life  which  seems  in  a  strange  way  to  veil  its 
true  aspect  ?  It  is  not  Death,  but  Life,  which 
wraps  us  about  with  shroud  and  cerement. 
Looking  at  this  world  as  it  is,  I  could  exclaim, 
How  beautiful,  if  one  could  but  get  at  it !  I  see 


TWO  FRIENDS.  41 

in  the  heart  of  man  an  infinite  desire,  an  infinite 
capacity  for  happiness ;  in  the  outward  world, 
abundant  materials  for  its  satisfaction ;  but 
between  these  two,  an  unseen  wall  of  separa 
tion.  We  want  a  door  opening." 

"  The  ordinary  events  of  life,"  I  said,  "  are 
not  strong  enough  to  move  the  whole  man  ;  its 
deeper  and  more  passionate  moments  show  us 
what  we  really  are.  There  is  a  child  within  us 
that  has  not  strength  to  come  forth,  until  some 
outward  stimulus,  some  strong  exterior  call,  is 
given.  And  this,  it  seems  to  me,  is  the  true 
use  of  the  Heroic,  of  a  life  transcending  life's 
ordinary  possibilities  ;  such  a  life  is  a  direct  call 
upon  the  soul,  saying,  '  Friend,  come  up  high 
er  ' ;  and  the  heart  recognizes  its  voice,  and 
exults  in  it,  claims  it,  as  the  voice  of  kindred 
risen  to  a  more  exalted  sphere.  It  is  like  air 
from  a  mountain  summit  where  we  could  not 
live,  and  yet  it  seems  our  native  air,  and  braces 
us  in  every  nerve." 

"  In  teaching  criminals,"  said  Philip,  "  of  a 
peculiarly  ignorant  and  degraded  class,  I  have 
often  been  struck  with  their  strange  susceptibil- 


42  TWO  FRIENDS. 

ity  to  what  is  morally  exalted.  To  tell  them  of 
a  deed  of  heroic  daring,  of  sublime  self-devotion, 
will  visibly  stir  a  fibre  of  their  hearts,  too  torpid 
to  respond  to  the  ordinary  appeals  of  duty  and 
reason.  I  have  also  observed,  that  anything 
legendary,  and  verging  on  the  supernatural,  wih1 
fix  their  attention  at  once,  as  if  it  awakened 
within  them  the  instinct  of  a  spiritual  nature, 
the  sense  that  man  lives  not  by  bread  alone.  In 
teaching,  perhaps,  we  usually  trust  too  much  to 
mere  intelligence  ;  surely  there  are  many  gate 
ways  into  the  soul.  Feeling  bursts  through 
them,  '  making  the  world  kin.'  Art  unlocks 
them  gently,  for  Art  is  not  the  imitation  of 
Nature,  but  a  sort  of  side-door  into  her  inmost 
recesses.  And  has  it  never  occurred  to  you  to 
remark,  that  there  is  a  whole  region,  connected 
with  all  that  is  finest  and  purest  in  our  nature, 
that  can  only  be  reached  through  sensation  ?  As 
a  look  will  reveal  what  no  word  can  ever  speak, 
so  will  a  scent,  a  sound,  the  spring's  warm 
breath,  the  green  unravelling  of  the  larch- 
bough,  a  sudden  whisper  in  the  summer  leaves, 
the  bird's  clear  song  at  early  morning,  bring  our 


TWO  FRIENDS.  43 

souls  into  contact  with  the  illimitable,  telling  us 
that  we  are  one  with  ourselves,  with  JJature, 
and  with  God ;  these  things  have  power  to  call 
forth  a  music  within  us  which  has  not  yet  had 
words  set  to  it.  Secrets  are  revealed  to  us  in  a 
flash  of  bliss,  —  a  flash  that  shows  us  nothing,  as 
when  a  wave  retires,  and  does  not  leave  at  our 
feet  even  a  shell,  which  we  can  pick  up,  to 
treasure  and  say,  '  This  came  from  a  further 
shore.' " 

"  But  the  sea,"  I  said,  "  implies  the  shore ; 
and  it  is  something  also  to  have  heard  the  mur 
mur  of  the  broad  ocean.  I  think  that  these 
moments,  these  intimations,  which  seem,  as  you 
once  observed  to  me,  to  come  from  a  great  dis 
tance,  prove  many  things,  —  prove,  above  all, 
that  man's  spirit  is  not  a  sand-locked  pool.  The 
slender  filaments  of  sensation  are  threads  that 
bind  us  to  a  mighty  whole,  and  it  is  a  higher, 
more  complete  existence,  —  the  life  in  the  whole, 
—  which,  through  them,  stirs  in  us,  perhaps  to 
sleep  the  next  moment." 

"  Beethoven,  if  you  remember,"  interrupted 
Philip,  "  said  that  music  was  the  link  between 


44  TWO  FRIENDS. 

rational  and  sensitive  life ;  it  addresses  both,  and 
owes  to  this  its  power ;  for  music,  of  all  the 
arts,  alone  reaches  to  that  within  us,  to  which 
the  others  can  only  appeal.  Like  divine  grace 
it  gets  fairly  within  the  mind  ;  and  while  things 
that  address  themselves  to  the  eye  or  intellect 
stand  at  the  door  and  knock,  it  has  already  car 
ried  in  its  message,  and  brought  us  into  an  inner 
world,  richer  and  sweeter  than  the  outward  one, 
yet  linked  with  it  at  every  turn.  What  is  there 
in  life,  as  it  now  is,  that  answers  to  the  feelings 
which  music  calls  forth, — 

"  Its  deeper  pangs,  its  tears 
More  sweet,"  — 

its  storming  at  the  citadel  of  feeling  through  a 
hundred  gates  at  once,  or  winning  it  through 
some  single  secret  postern?  You  read,  you 
think,  you  ponder,  and,  lo !  a  grinding  organ  at 
the  corner  of  the  street,  playing  some  common 
tune,  sends  a  fresh  breath  across  your  soul,  that 
turns  over  a  new  leaf  within  it,  writ  all  over 
with  deeper,  sweeter  lore  than  was  ever  magi 
cian's  book." 

"  And  surely,"  I  said,   "  in  considering  this 


TWO  FRIENDS.  45 

subject,  we  must  not  forget  the  strange  regions 
into  which  some  of  the  abnormal  phases,  of  mind 
admit  us.  What  we  commonly  call  "  excite 
ment,"  is  but  the  awakening  of  the  whole  man. 
Is  it  not,  whether  it  arise  from  some  tumult  of 
inner  feeling,  or  the  pressure  of  strong  outward 
exigency,  always  accompanied  by  a  feeling  of 
freedom,  of  power  over  outward  nature,  of 
escape  from  the  limitations  of  time  and  space, 
by  a  sense  of  being  able  to  triumph  over  them 
at  will  ?  There  is  surely  something  significant 
in  its  temporary  insensibility  to  cold,  hunger, 
weariness ;  while  excitement  lasts,  we  feel  none 
of  these.  Also,  in  dreaming,  in  delirium,  or 
when  under  the  influence  of  narcotics,  the  soul 
unfurls  the  wings,  which  life,  under  its  ordinary 
conditions,  keeps  pressed  and  folded  helplessly 
against  its  side.  The  sense  of  power,  of  free 
dom,  above  all,  of  extension,  is  characteristic  of 
all  these  states ;  and  does  not  this,  as  an  ad 
mitted  fact,  throw  a  light  upon  our  future  life, 
proving  that  mans  capacities  are  as  undeveloped 
as  is  confessedly  the  case  with  his  faculties  ?  We 
are  used  to  call  the  accustomed  order  of  things 


46  TWO  FRIENDS. 

natural,  but  is  it  not  evident  that  man,  viewed 
in  connection  with  this  order,  is  a  supernatural 
being?  He  contains  within  him  powers  and 
tendencies  far  greater  than  the  present  order  of 
things  calls  out." 

"  There  is  just  now,"  said  Philip,  "  a  strange 
jealousy  of  the  supernatural ;  a  disposition,  as 
shown  in  rejecting  whatever  is  miraculous,  to 
restrict  even  God  to  one  mode  of  working.  In 
moral  things,  it  is  true,  he  has,  indeed  can  have, 
but  one  form  of  expression ;  but  in  material 
things,  what  is  the  supernatural  but  a  stretch 
ing  of  the  senses,  so  as  to  take  in  a  little  more 
of  God,  an  extension  of  our  own  horizon,  so  as 
to  give  us  a  broader  view  of  the  way  in  which 
he  acts  ?  What  is  a  miracle,  once  proved,  but 
a  fact,  which  extends  our  view  of  the  capabili 
ties  of  nature  ?  How  are  we  to  limit  the  possi 
bilities  wrapped  up  within  any  created  being,  as 
the  butterfly  is  anticipated,  prepared  for,  in  the 
grub,  the  oak  latent  in  the  acorn  ?  Man,  it  is 
evident,  even  in  that  part  of  him  which  is  sen 
sitive,  is  forever  touching  upon  a  system  of 
things  upon  which,  under  the  present  conditions 


TWO  FRIENDS.  47 

of  his  being,  lie  cannot  enter  fully.  There  is 
within  him  an  enchanted  land  of  mystery  and 
beauty,  a  land  where  all  slumbers,  until  some 
outward  shock,  like  the  kiss  of  the  Fairy  Prince, 
comes  to  awake  it  from  sleep.  So  in  that  part 
of  our  nature  which  is  spiritual,  there  is  a  region 
into  which  man  cannot  ascend  until  he  is  lifted 
there  by  God  through  that  supernatural  action 
upon  the  soul  which  we  call  grace  ;  the  voice  of 
the  Divine  Spirit  wakening  up  the  human  spirit 
to  its  true  life." 

"  And  hence,"  I  said,  "  the  connection  of 
Christianity  with  poetry,  music,  nature,  with  all 
the  purer  and  more  exalted  movements  of  the 
natural  heart.  These  are  helps,  lifts  to  the 
soul ;  and  people  feel  better,  more  able  to  be 
lieve,  to  love,  to  pray,  when  the  finer  springs 
of  existence  have  been  touched  through  any  of 
these.  Genius,  like  Christianity,  sees  all  things 
in  their  mutual  relation ;  its  tendency  is  to 
throw  the  many-chambered  mansions  of  the 
soul  into  one.  The  simplest  song,  where  its 
breath  is  felt,  stirs  something  which  goes 
through  the  whole.  Is  there  not  a  delight. 


48  TWO  FRIENDS. 

almost  a  religious  pleasure,  in  a  work  of  true 
imaginative  genius?  a  delight  kindred  to  that 
which  is  derived  from  the  contemplation  of 
nature,  —  the  delight  of  being  carried  out  of 
one's  self  into  something  greater  and  truer  than 
self,  because  more  universal.  It  often  seems  to 
me  that  Imagination  is  the  highest  faculty  of 
man.  It  starts,  as  Faith  does,  from  a  higher 
level  than  any  of  his  other  powers,  and  on  that 
level  meets  and  familiarly  accosts  truths  which 
reason  must  struggle  up  to.  And  reason  does 
reach  them,  when  they  are  thus  foreshown, 
though,  left  to  itself,  it  could  never  either  have 
foreseen  the  glorious  end,  nor  even  the  way  that 
led  to  it." 

"  Imagination,  however,"  returned  Philip, 
"  '  wins  heights  that  it  is  not  competent  to 
keep ' ;  it  alights  on  the  mountain-top,  and  is 
shown  kingdoms  in  a  moment  of  time ;  but  it 
cannot  keep  its  footing  on  that  summit.  Reason 
must  hew  steps  out  of  the  rock  ;  patient  experi 
ence  must  follow  after  to  make  the  path  in 
which  the  wayfaring  man  shall  not  err." 

"  And  yet,"  I  said,  "  the  Idealist  is  always 


TWO  FRIENDS.  49 

the  discoverer,  the  one  who  proclaims  the 
goodly  vision.  It  has  ever  been  so  h>  science ; 
there  is  something  prophetic  in  its  very  nature, 
something  which  ever  impels  it  forward,  and 
carries  it  beyond  the  word  it  is  now  speaking ; 
which  weights  that  word  with  a  meaning  which 
the  speaker  intends  not.  So  does  the  Poet 
speak  out  of  his  heart  things  which  he  knows 
not.  He  is  a  man  not  truer,  better,  or  kinder 
than  his  fellows ;  his  range  of  practical  sympa 
thies  with  others  is,  perhaps,  from  his  very  na 
ture,  more  limited  than  that  of  ordinary  men. 
It  is  not  experience,  it  is  not  feeling,  it  is 
instinct,  that  has  made  him  at  home  in  all  that 
belongs  to  man.  He  sits  beside  the  secret 
springs  of  feeling,  and  knows  the  course  the 
rivers  must  take.  He  sees,  but  afar  off  and 
dimly,  the  whole  in  which  the  part  is  included. 
He  who  has  the  soul  has  all." 

Philip's  eyes  sparkled.  "I  know,"  he  said, 
"no  such  pleasure,  such  emancipation,  as  that 
of  passing  from  the  limited  self-referring  view 
of  things  into  the  contemplation  of  absolute  truth 
and  beauty.  I  love  to  hear  you  speak  thus, 


50  TWO  FRIENDS. 

you,  who  sometimes  seem  to  fear  the  broad, 
free  sweep  of  imaginative  greatness,  as  being  in 
some  way  antagonistic  to  the  spirit  of  Christ, 
who  seem  to  dread,  for  instance,  the  free  devel 
opment  of  Art,  though,  after  all,  Art  is  but 
Nature  in  her  bridal  hour,  the  shy  virgin,  the 
wild  woodland  nymph  wooed  and  wedded  by 
man,  and  brought  home  to  dwell  with  him." 
"I  know  not,"  I  said,  "how  to  express  clearly 
what  I  mean;  but  I  do  feel,  sometimes  pain 
fully,  a  contradiction  between  the  brokenness  of 
Christ  and  the  clear  perfection  of  Art.  The 
glory  of  the  Terrestrial  is  one,  and  the  glory  of 
the  Celestial  is  another,  and  these  stars  differ, 
the  one  from  the  other  in  glory.  In  Art  there 
is  choice,  self-pleasing,  a  drawing  out  of  that 
which  is  obviously  best ;  in  Christ,  things  which 
are  not  fair  are  yet  pronounced  good,  prizeable. 
Sometimes,  after  reading  such  a  book,  we  will 
say,  as  Shakespeare,  I  have  been  conscious  of  a 
strange  inner  dissatisfaction,  which  I  can  only 
describe  as  being  the  sense  of  an  impaired  com 
munion  ;  and  something  has  said  within  me, 
4  All  this  is  not  of  the  Father,  but  of  the  world.' 


TWO  FRIENDS.  51 

I  do  not  feel  this  in  reading  any  book  of  a  sus 
tained  philosophic  interest,  as  its  scope,*if  not 
directly  religious,  carries  you  among  the  deep 
and  elevating  realities  which  are  not  far  from 
the  Kingdom,  and  indeed  belong  to  it ;  but  I  do 
feel  it  in  that  mixed  region  of  wit,  and  fancy, 
and  feeling  which  belongs  to  our  mortal  state  as 
such,  and  which  seems  in  no  way  to  bear  upon 
our  inner  or  our  future  life ;  and  what  is  this 
region  but  a  world  without  souls,  a  world  of  sad 
and  ruined  beauty,  when  looked  at  with  refer 
ence  to  man's  true  destinies,  and  yet  a  rich  and 
glorious  world  ?  I  see  in  Art  and  Literature,  in 
the  subjects  with  which  they  deal,  in  the  absorb 
ing,  intoxicating  devotion  they  demand,  some 
thing  which  reminds  me  of  the  Greek  worship 
of  Dionysus,  "the  God  of  flourishing,  decaying, 
changeable  life,"  the  kindler  of  a  lofty  enthusi 
asm,  the  intensifier  of  life,  the  exalter  of  its  pleas 
ures,  the  deepener  of  its  pangs,  the  bestower  of 
an  impassioned  sympathy  with  Nature.  And 
by  the  side  of  this  regal  Being,  robed  in  the 
purple  he  was  born  to,  with,  garments  not  too 
careful  of  a  stain,  I  see  another  form,  severe, 


52  TWO  FRIENDS. 

restricted,  also  life's  deepener,  its  intensifier,  but 
after  how  different  a  spirit !  The  first  is  of  the 
earth,  earthy ;  the  second  is  the  Lord  from 
heaven. 

"  The  rose,  ho !  the  rose  is  the  grace  of  the  earth, 
Is  the  light  of  the  plants  that  are  growing  upon  it." 

The  rose  drunk  with  its  own  fragrance  and 
beauty ;  the  smell  of  the  fresh  earth  hangs  about 
it,  —  it  is  wet  with  the  dews  of  heaven.  '  En 
joy  me,'  it  says,  '  for  I  am  the  rose,  I  am  fair, 
I  live  but  a  day ' ;  it  needs  the  broad  sunlight, 
the  free  sweeping  winds,  it  can  bloom  even  on 
the  battle-field,  and  grow  redder  with  the  blood 
of  heroes.  But  Christ's  flower  grows  under 
neath  the  snow,  in  a  broken  flower-pot,  in  a 
darkened  cellar,  anywhere  ;  its  petals  are  pale, 
and  it  seldom  opens  fully  ;  but  when  it  expands 
so  as  to  show  its  heart,  what  do  we  see  there 
but  the  Cross  and  the  emblems  of  the  Pas 
sion?"  

Philip  was  silent  a  long  while ;  at  last  he  said, 
musingly,  — 

"  I  have  felt  the  antagonism  you  speak  -of.  I 
have  found  it  out,  as  I  have  found  out  many 


TWO  FRIENDS.  53 

antagonisms  and  affinities,  by  their  helping  or 
hindering  me  in  my  work.  I  shall  never-  forget 
sitting  at  an  open  window  of  a  little  parsonage, 
in  the  west  of  England,  during  great  part  of  a 
golden  summer's  afternoon,  reading  Keats ;  the 
garden  was  full  of  flowers,  and  I  read  my  book 
to  the  scent  of  mignonette  and  pinks,  as  to  a 
music  stealing  within  every  sense.  It  was  one 
of  those  warm,  brooding  days  that  steep  the 
spirit  in  delight ;  all  around  was  silence,  the 
stillness  not  so  much  of  sleep  as  of  nature  in  a 
blissful  dream.  Then  an  uneasy  consciousness 
came  across  me,  breaking  the  delicious  spell.  I 
ought  to  be  setting  forth  on  my  parish  round.  I 
started.  First  on  my  list  came  an  aged  woman, 
almost  stone-deaf,  ignorant,  but  anxious.  I  had 
to  sit  beside  her  before  a  huge  fire ;  her  son 
worked  at  his  loom  in  an  inner  room,  and  did 
not  cease  when  I  began  to  read.  How  hot  and 
noisy  the  cottage  seemed ;  how  contracted  all 
around  me  !  Had  the  world  of  light  and  beauty 
I  lived  and  moved  in  but  half  an  hour  ago 
collapsed  into  this  ?  How  confused,  too,  seemed 
my  own  statements,  my  very  utterance  thick 


54  TWO  FRIENDS. 

and  hesitating,  as  of  one  under  a  heavy  thrall, 
for  my  heart  was  with  Endymion,  and  I  had  to 
tell  the  story  of  Christ ;  to  tell  it  from  its  begin 
ning  to  its  end  ;  to  tell  it,  too,  to  a  person  to 
whom  it  was  really  news,  and  received  as  such 

with  eager  childlike  interest Another  time, 

and  here  the  revulsion  was  even  keener,  this 
was  in  winter,  New  Year's  day,  also  an  after 
noon  ;  one  of  those  days  when  the  clear  frosty 
air  seems  to  make  thought  itself  more  definite, 
and  to  send  it  forth  with  an  arrowy  keenness. 
You  know  the  cathedral  at ;  I  was  walk 
ing  beneath  it  with  a  friend,  eagerly  discussing 
Homer ;  the  sun  went  down,  all  that  fine  range 
of  buildings  stood  up  clear  against  the  solemn, 
rose-flushed  sky.  We  spoke  of  the  antique 
world ;  its  simplicity,  its  freedom,  its  ever  youth 
ful,  self-renewing  charm.  I  was  suddenly  called 
away  to  see  a  woman  supposed  to  be  dying.  I 
found  her,  as  regarded  spiritual  receptivity,  far 
below  the  old  friend  I  have  just  spoken  of. 
Hers  was  the  unawakened,  unenlightened  mind, 
within  which  the  sense  of  sin  and  need  has 
never  sent  a  piercing  ray,  or  a  quickening 


TWO  FRIENDS.  55 

throb ;  one  of  the  class  to  whom  a  visit  from 
a  clergyman  is  a  viaticum  and  nothing'  more. 
Her  husband,  an  elderly  working-man,  received 
me  at  the  door  with  much  show  of  friendliness  ; 
as  he  seemed  disposed  to  talk,  I  sat  with  him  a 
few  minutes  before  I  went  to  the  sick  woman. 
By  way,  I  suppose,  of  making  himself  agreeable 
to  me,  he  brought  forth  some  tracts,  and  began 
to  speak  of  religion  in  a  patronizing  sort  of  way, 
not  uncommon  amongst  the  poor,  as  if  it  were 
an  accomplishment,  something  admirable  in  its 
own  way,  —  an  acquisition,  like  knowing  French 
or  Latin,  to  those  who  possessed  it,  but  by  no 
means  of  universal  obligation.  '  Yes,'  he  said, 
4  they  were  very  pretty  reading,  he  had  no  fault 
to  find  with  them ;  prayer,  too,  was  a  nice 
thing;  good  talk  was  very  pretty  and  very  nice.' 
I  found  that  neither  he  nor  any  of  his  family 
ever  attended  church,  or  any  place  of  worship. 
He  took  me  to  a  small  inner  room,  dark  and 
close,  in  which  were  two  beds,  almost  filling  it. 
The  sick  woman  was  in  one,  suffering  much 
from  spasms,  too  ill  apparently  to  fix  her  mind 
upon  what  I  said.  I  spoke  with  her,  however, 


56  TWO  FRIENDS. 

as  I  best  could.  Seating  myself,  in  the  absence 
of  any  chair,  upon  the  other  bed,  suddenly  I  felt 
something  move  beneath  me.  The  poor  woman 
hastened  to  apologize :  it  was  her  grown-up  son 
sleeping  off  the  drunken  frolic  of  the  night  be 
fore,— New  Year's  Eve." 

"  But  these,"  I  said,  laughing,  "  were  very 
sharp  contrasts,  very  sudden  descents  into  the 
actual ;  no  wonder  your  system  was  jarred  and 
shaken  a  little  rudely.  You  might  have  been 
called  to  such  a  dying-bed  as  that  you  were  tell 
ing  me  of  yesterday,  the  poor  woman,  "  the 
sinner  exceedingly,"  who  had  spent  literally 
more  than  half  of  her  short  and  evil  life  in 
prisons,  dying  in  jail  at  last,  ignorant,  hopeless, 
yet  not  without  hope,  for  Christ  died  for  the 
ungodly.  In  such  a  case  the  transition  from 
the  ideal  to  the  actual  would  have  been  keen, 
perhaps,  but  less  perplexing." 

"  True,"  returned  Philip,  "  because  in  the 
human  soul  '  one  deep  calleth  to  another.' 
There  is  a  poetry  in  crime,  in  excessive  want 
and  wretchedness,  in  fact  in  all  the  fierce  ex 
tremes  of  life,  that  lifts  the  soul  above  its  ordi- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  57 

nary  level,  that  stirs  human  nature  to  its  very 
depths,  and  makes  us  know  that 

'  We  have  all  of  us  one  human  heart, 
All  mortal  thoughts  confess  a  common  home.' 

Life  can  be  transfigured  through  anguish  as  well 
as  through  blessedness,  and  Christ  still  shows 
himself,  as  in  the  mediaeval  legends,  in  the  form 
of  the  leper  and  the  outcast.  But  after  all, 
such  keen  emotions  do  not  make  up  the  staple 
of  spiritual  any  more  than  of  natural  life.  It 
is  among  the  ignorant,  the  out-of-the-way,  the 
commonplace,  that  the  Christian's  daily  lot  is 
thrown,  and  their  daily  appeals  are  to  him  as 
sacred  as  those  which  come  more  seldom,  and 
with  a  louder  knocking  at  the  gate.  That 
Christianity  should  so  fit  in  with  the  ordinary 
and  mediocre  has  always  seemed  to  me  a  proof 
of  its  crowning  excellence.  '  A  little  child  shall 
lead  them,'  this,  it  seems  to  me,  is  the  pass-word 
into  this  kingdom  of  greatness  and  simplicity. 
All  other  ideals  draw  away  the  heart  from  real 
life  ;  the  poet,  the  artist,  is  continually  trying  to 
break  out  of  the  narrow  circle  of  visible  things ; 
he  t  asks  for  better  bread  than  can  be  made 


58  TWO  FRIENDS. 

with  wheat.'  The  Christian  ideal  alone  meets 
the  habitual,  the  practical,  —  meets  it  while  im 
measurably  transcending  it,  —  embraces  it,  and 
walks  with  it  hand  in  hand.  The  Christian 
must  be  friends  with  every  day,  with  its  nar 
row  details,  its  homely  atmosphere ;  its  loving 
correction  must  make  him  great." 

He  paused  for  a  moment. 

"Is  there  not,"  he  said,  "the  very  life-core  of 
Christianity  in  this  picture, — the  broken  tomb 
and  the  risen  Christ,  the  angels  in  their  shining 
garments,  the  linen  clothes  folded,  and  laid  in  a 
place  by  themselves?" 


NE  morning  I  found  Philip  looking 
over  some  of  my  papers ;  he  took 
up  one,  "  A  Soul's  History,"  and 


began  to  read  it  aloud. 


"  The  soul  is  a  rare  essence ;  like  the  quick 
And  subtle  spirit  of  the  rose,  it  floods 
Each  chamber  of  its  earthly  house  with  fragrance, 
Yet  leaves,  like  it,  no  lingering  breath  behind, 
Its  sweetness  taking  with  it  where  it  goes ; 
Else  had  this  grave,  like  His,  who,  once  of  old, 
Slept  in  a  garden-tomb,  been  full  of  odors ; 
And  through  this  bare,  black  ground  would  roses  spring, 
To  tell  of  one  who  lies  within,  wrapt  round 

.  In  folds  of  linen  clean  and  white ;  embalmed 
In  sweeter  tears  than  ever  fell  from  gums 
Of  Araby  the  Blest. 

"  Beside  this  open  grave  one  winter  morn 
I  stood  as  if  alone,  the  hundreds  round  me 
Swayed  by  one  thought,  and  by  a  single  name 


60  TWO  FRIENDS. 

Together  bound  so  close,  it  seemed  one  heart 
Held  by  one  sorrow,  by  one  hope  uplifted ; 
Upon  the  stillness  fell  the  words  of  Christ: 
'  I  am  the  life,  and  I  the  resurrection ; 
He  that  in  me  believeth  shall  not  die ' ; 
And  through  the  sound  of  falling  earth,  the  voice 
Went  steadfast  on:  'As  God  unto  himself 
In  mercy  hath  been  pleased  to  take  the  soul 
Of  this  our  Brother  '  —  pausing  ere  the  word 
It  faltered  forth  —  '  of  this  our  Father ' ;  then 
One  sob  broke  forth,  for,  oh !  on  this  our  earth 
We  have  not  many  Fathers !  few  who  go 
To  meet  the  wanderer  on  his  homeward  way, 
Who  watch  him  yet  afar,  who  on  the  threshold 
With  welcome  wait,  and  reconciling  tear. 

"  Thou  knewest  him,  this  man  of  faith  and  power; 
Thou  knewest  him,  this  Son  of  Consolation, 
God's  Levite  of  the  kindlier  covenant. 
On  thine  his  soul,  a  white  and  lucid  star, 
Shook  down  serene  its  full  meridian  splendor, 
For  thou  didst  know  him  in  that  after-summer 
God  ofttimes  gives  the  good,  that  they  may  see 
Their  soul's  deep  travail  satisfied  in  part, 
And  bless  him  ere  they  pass  from  life  away ; 
But  I  had  known  him  in  his  rise  and  falling, 
Had  seen  him  sit  upon  the  earth,  as  one 
Astonished,  desolate,  within  his  heart 
An  arrow  and  the  fragments  of  a  song. 

" 4  What  aileth  thee  that  now 
Thou  contest  back  so  soon,  my  child; 


TWO  FRIENDS.  61 

In  that  garden  fair,  methought,  all  day, 
Till  the  shadows  fell  thou  wouldst  wait  to  play  "  ; 
So  spake  the  mother  mild. 

"  But  the  child  said,  weeping  sore, 

'  /  have  been  where  the  roses  blow, 
The  ruby  red  and  the  maiden's  blush, 
And  the  damask  rose  in  its  velvet  Jlush, 

And  the  white  rose  dropping  snow. 

"  '  I  will  never  pluck  roses  more, 
Go  take  of  these.    .    .    .'" 

"I  like  this  poem,"  he  said.  "Why  have 
you  left  it  unfinished  ?  " 

I  looked  at  the  date,  which  was  many  years 
back.  "  Perhaps,"  I  answered,  "  because  my 
heart,  since  those  days,  has,  in  some  degree,  de 
parted  from  the  idea  upon  which  it  is  founded." 

"  And  your  idea,"  said  Philip,  "  was  that  of 
a  life  rising,  through  earthly  blight  and  disap 
pointment,  into  high  spiritual  perfection ;  the 
flowers  of  individual  love  dropping  off  to  give 
place  to  ripe,  universal  charity.  I  see  you  have 
written,  a  little  further  on,  — 

'  Seek  not  to  live,  to  die  in  any  heart. 
This  earthly  rose,  if  pressed,  will  yield  the  thorn ; 
0,  let  it  bloom,  its  odor  still  diffusing! '  " 


62  TWO  FlUENDS. 

"  Yes,"  I  said,  "  the  idea  of  a  beautiful  moral 
and  spiritual  life,  being  built  up  out  of  the  ruins 
of  the  fair  fabric  of  natural  hope  and  happiness, 
is  a  favorite  one,  we  all  know,  in  religious  fic 
tion ;  take,  as  an  instance,  Lamartine's  exqui 
site  story  of  the  Stone-cutter  of  St.  Point ;  and 
it  has  undoubtedly  been  in  some  degree  realized 
in  actual  life,  but  far  less  often  and  less  fully 
than  the  commonplaces  which  prevail  with  ref 
erence  to  affliction  would  lead  us  to  believe. 
All  that  passes  current  upon  this  subject  is 
founded  upon  a  partial  truth,  which  ignores  a 
deeper  one,  which  is  this,  that  the  plant  of  Hu 
manity  does  not  live  by  its  root  only,  however 
firmly  this  may  be  fixed  ;  it  breathes  at  every 
pore,  through  leaf  and  blossom  ;  it  is  nourished 
by  the  curling  tendrils  that  seem  but  to  adorn 
it.  If  these  be  torn  off  too  unsparingly,  its 
fruit  will  be  the  poorer  ;  if  its  bark  be  stripped, 
it  will  live,  but  as  dying.  How  often  do  we  see 
the  growth  of  a  life  stopped !  —  a  life  unable, 
either  from  the  blight  of  unfriendly  outward 
circumstances,  or  the  strange  warp  of  some 
radical  inward  contradiction,  to  'reveal  the  true 
beauty  of  its  nature." 


TWO  FRIENDS.  63 

"  It  seems  to  me,"  said  Philip,  "  that  I  have 
known  such  lives,  unable  to  shoot  up  straight 
to  heaven,  like  the  palm,  or  to  bend  down 
richly  laden  to  earth,  like  the  banian ;  lives  off 
the  usual  track ;  lives  in  which  there  is  a  pain 
ful  secret,  and  yet  pure,  exalted  lives ;  truer  and 
nobler  in  their  aim,  richer  even  in  their  attain 
ment,  than  those  whose  development  has  been 
more  free  and  happy ;  souls  that  utter  not  their 
perfect  worth,  yet  are  sweet  in  the  very  broken- 
ness  of  their  music." 

"  True ;  yet  it  is  certain  that  something 
artificial  and  distorted  is  apt  to  creep  within 
a  life,  which,  from  whatever  cause,  is  unable 
to  flow  along  in  the  broad  channel  of  such 

O 

interests  as  are  common  to  humanity.  There 
are  many  ghosts  in  life,  appearing  in  the  noon 
day  as  well  as  at  midnight.  Dead  hopes  and 
loves  come  back  in  strange  forms ;  tenderness 
changed  to  an  irritable  sensitiveness  ;  clinging 
affection  to  grasping  vanity.  The  tendrils  that 
have  lost  their  natural  object  still  find  some 
thing  to  cling  round;  but  what?  A  cold  am 
bition  ;  a  thin  transfiguration  of  self.  Do  you 


64  TWO  FRIENDS. 

know  the  story  of  Agusina,  the  Greenlander, 
one  of  the  most  earnest  and  gifted  among  the 
converts  of  the  United  Brethren  ?  His  own 
people  would  listen  to  him  with  singular  vener 
ation,  as  he  spoke  to  them  of  Christ,  of  the 
breath  of  the  Spirit,  '  wafting  the  heart  to  Him, 
as  the  sea-grass  is  driven  to  shore  on  the  current 
of  the  tide.'  '  His  love,'  he  would  say,  4  melts 
the  heart,  as  the  sun  melts  the  snow ;  and  then 
it  is  as  with  the  lamp,  when  fresh  oil  is  poured 
into  it;  it  burns  brighter,  and  can  enkindle 
others.  O  Assarsoi !  *  when  I  speak  of  thee, 
my  heart  grows  tender,  as  the  moss  in  spring, 
and  soft,  as  the  eider  fowl's  breast,  when  shel 
tering  its  young ! '  He  had  an  only  daughter, 
Beata,  aged  fifteen,  who  read  the  Scriptures  to 
him  each  evening,  when  their  voices  were  heard 
to  ascend  together  in  hymns.  His  wife  was 
dead;  all  his  near  relations,  parents,  brother, 
and  sisters,  were  gone,  but  not  until  he  had  per 
suaded  them  to  embrace  Christianity.  Beata 
prepared  his  meals,  and  took  charge  of  all; 
when  he  came  home  from  his  hunting  or  fish- 
*  Eedeemer. 


TWO  FRIENDS.  65 

ing,  she  would  stand  anxiously  waiting  his  re 
turn.  She,  too,  was  taken  from  him  by  death. 
Agusina  bore  the  shock  but  feebly.  Except 
Christ,  he  said,  she  was  his  all  on  earth  ;  he 
missed  his  loved  companion,  when  he  came  from 
the  sea  or  from  the  mountains  ;  even  the  words 
of  Scripture,  heard  from  her  lips  no  longer, 
seemed  to  lose  half  their  charm.  He  gave  way 
to  excessive  sorrow ;  but  it  was  after  the  first 
violence  of  this  passed  over,  that  the  mission 
aries  observed  a  singular  transformation.  Self- 
complacency  rushed  in  to  fill  the  void  which 
had  fallen  on  his  desolated  soul ;  his  heart 
became  self-centred ;  it  found  a  solace  in  the 
respect  paid  by  his  people  ;  a  flattering  unc 
tion  in  the  veneration  and  interest  with  which, 
at  the  gatherings  for  hunting  and  fishing,  they 
listened  to  his  words.  There  was  a  change 
even  in  his  outward  aspect  and  bearing,  a 
change  visible  to  all.  At  last  one  of  the  faith 
ful  Moravians  spoke  to  him  of  it  freely ;  he  lis 
tened  in  surprise  and  displeasure.  A  few  days 
afterwards,  however,  he  came,  confessing  it  was 
true ;  that  he  had  striven  to  deal  with  himself 


66  TWO  FRIENDS. 

faithfully,  and  that  God  had  given  him  light: 
his  mind  was  still  so  disturbed  that  he  absent 
ed  himself  from  the  Holy  Communion.  And 
weeks  passed  over;  no  one  saw  Agusina  at 
the  meetings  or  the  confessions  ;  and  when  the 
Moravians  sought  him  out,  they  found  him, 
they  say,  '  in  happy  intercourse  with  the  Friend 
of  his  soul,  but  with  the  hand  of  death  upon 
him.'  He  was  going,  he  said,  to  Beata ;  '  earth 
was  no  longer  safe  for  him;  it  was  full  of 
snares  ;  and  God  was,  in  his  mercy,  about 
to  take  him  away.'  On  the  last  day  of  his 
life,  his  people  gathered  round  him.  All  the 
strength  and  self-possession  of  his  soul  had  re 
turned.  '  His  countenance,'  says  the  Mora 
vian  writer,  '  seemed  to  us  like  that  of  an 
angel.'  In  the  dim  December  day,  more  by 
the  light  of  the  snow  than  of  the  sky,  they  laid 
him,  with  a  solemn  prayer  and  hymn,  in  his 
Beata's  grave,  close  to  her  moss- wrapped  re 
mains. 

"  This  story  has  always  seemed  to  me  deeply 
affecting,  and  the  more  so  from  my  having,  not 
many  years  ago,  heard  a  pendant  to  it,  in  the 


TWO  FRIENDS.  67 

case  of  a  distinguished  man  now  living,  in 
whose  character  vanity  of  a  transparent*  sort 
had  always  been  noticeable  ;  yet  it  was  remark 
able,  I  was  told,  into  what  strong,  unsubdued 
relief  this  had  come  since  the  death  of  his  be 
loved  only  child.  But,  to  consider  this  subject 
in  a  broader  light,  —  is  there  not  something  fal 
lacious  in  looking  at  affliction  as  a  sort  of  divine 
alchemy,  with  power  in  itself  to  transmute  and 
sublimate  ?  At  the  most,  it  can  but  work  upon 
what  it  finds  ;  it  purges  the  dross  from  the  gold, 
according  to  the  image  so  frequently  employed 
in  Scripture,  but  does  not  change  the  original 
nature  of  the  ore  into  one  of  nobler  quality. 

"  And  to  extend  our  view  a  little  further,  can 
anything  be  more  false  than  the  so  often  re 
peated  maxim,  that  good  comes  out  of  evil, 
moral  evil  ?  —  never,  in  the  sense  of  being  pro 
duced  by  it.  All  that  evil  can  do,  is  to  make 
good  manifest ;  as  oppression  calls  forth  heroism, 
or,  as  in  family  life,  the  selfishness  of  one  mem 
ber  brings  out  the  excellence  of  another.  Yet, 
in  the  very  instances  where  this  is  most  admira 
bly  shown,  we  may  still  say,  that  4  if  one  mem- 


68  TWO  FRIENDS. 

ber  suffer,  all  the  members  suffer  with  it ' ;  all 
life  is  organic,  and  no  individual  ever  neglects 
or  violates  a  moral  or  social  obligation,  but  a 
wound,  more  or  less  directly  felt,  goes  through 
the  whole.  The  work  of  righteousness  is 
peace ;  the  natural  tendency  of  good  is  to  re 
produce  itself:  even  so  does  evil  sow  itself  ad 
infinitum;  unless,  through  repentance,  it  ceases 
to  be  evil,  and  even,  after  repentance,  the  seed 
beforehand  cast  into  the  earth  will  still  come  up. 
We  see  this  in  the  life  of  nations.  What  con 
fusion  and  anarchy  result  from  forced  appropri 
ation  and  unequal  laws  !  A  life  may  slowly  get 
over  a  great  sorrow,  but  when  does  a  country 
get  over  a  great  wrong  ?  Germany  was  at  least 
two  centuries  in  recovering  from  the  effects  of 
the  Thirty  Years'  War,  and  it  is  certain  that 
Italy  yet  suffers  from  the  desolating  invasions  of 
the  sixteenth  century.  What  has  Ireland  been 
to  England,  or  Poland  to  Russia,  but  a  standing 
perplexity  from  age  to  age  ?  What  else  is  the 
African  population  even  now  to  America  ?  It 
is  not  only  the  wronged  who  suffer.  The  roots 
of  Humanity  are  so  inextricably  intertwined, 


TWO  FRIENDS.  69 

that  we  must  grow  altogether  if  we  grow  at  all. 
Every  warp  and  canker  tells  upon  the  whole." 

u  True,"  said  Philip,  "  as  regards  evil  of  a 
moral  kind;  but  in  pain  and  affliction,  into 
which  this  element  does  not  enter,  I  see  much 
of  the  alchemy  which  you  disallow.  There  is 
something  in  man  which  needs  sorrow,  a  hum 
bling,  purifying  work  as  regards  his  spiritual 
recreation,  which  cannot  go  on  without  its  min 
istry.  How  many  heavenly  seeds  would  never 
spring  to  life  but  for  its  loosening,  detaching 
agency,  breaking  up  the  hard,  stony  soil  of 
nature  !  And  to  the  believer,  what  is  affliction 
but  God's  hand  upon  his  head  to  bless  him,  his 
Father's  hand,  recognized  through  that  heavy 
pressure  ?  Think  how  Christianity  exalts,  al 
most  enthrones  sorrow." 

"  Because,"  I  said,  "  Christianity  itself  is 
among  us  as  one  that  is  wounded,  '  free  among 
the  dead,'  and  only  free  there.  Do  you  not  see 
that  Christianity,  under  its  present  manifesta 
tion,  is  remedial,  separation  and  sorrow  are  its 
natural  friends  ?  Consider,  for  instance,  how 
great,  even  to  disproportion,  is  the  strain  which 


70  TWO  FRIENDS. 

the  Gospel  lays  upon  the  passive  qualities  of  the 
soul,  those  which  tend  to  the  death  of  the  natural 
man,  —  acquiescence,  long-suffering,  self-abnega 
tion.  The  Earth  is  given  to  the  meek,  and 
Heaven  to  the  poor  in  spirit.  Christ's  kingdom 
is  a  kingdom  of  patience.  Think  of  that  sol 
emn  walk,  when  he  '  went  before '  his  disciples 
to  Jerusalem ;  his  counsel  of  absolute  self-re 
nunciation  to  the  young  ruler ;  his  acceptance 
of  Peter's  '  Lo !  we  have  left  all ' ;  his  rebuke 
to  the  self-seeking  of  the  two  brethren  ;  his  un 
folding  of  his  own  approaching  humiliation. 
What  is  it  but  a  call  to  Humanity  to  strip  off  its 
garments  one  by  one,  riches,  affection,  glory, 
and  lay  them  down  in  the  way  by  which  its 
Lord  walks  to  death." 

"  If  I  follow  your  meaning  clearly,"  returned 
Philip,  "  you  would  say  that  there  is  a  natural 
grandeur  and  completeness,  which  the  soul,  if 
it  would  have  Christ  formed  within  it,  must  be 
content  to  miss." 

"  And  this  because  Christianity  does  not  as  yet 
take  in  the  whole  of  man ;  it  is  the  bringer  of 
the  sword,  setting  one  part  of  his  nature  in  array 


TWO  FRIENDS.  71 

against  the  other ;  it  bids  him  emphatically  lay 
down  his  life,  but  to  what  end  ?  TJiat  he  may 
take  it  again.  We  do  not  gain  a  true  conception 
of  Christianity  until  we  look  at  it  under  this 
twofold  aspect ;  until  we  see  in  it  a  seed  sown 
in  weakness  to  be  raised  in  power;  until  we 
covet,  for  every  individual  soul,  that  restitution 
which  the  Universal  Church  will  one  day  most 
certainly  enjoy,  —  the  taking  again  of  life  in 
Christ.  Christ  is  most  truly  and  deeply  a  man 
of  sorrows  ;  yet  in  his  revelation  there  is  nothing 
of  that  dull  and  aimless  suffering  which  in  nat 
ural  life  is  so  saddening  and  perplexing.  The 
song  of  Moses  and  of  the  Lamb,  which  none  but 
the  redeemed  can  sing,  has  the  burden  of  the  old 
Greek  chorus, 

'  Sing  sorrow,  strife  and  sorrow,  but  let  Victory  remain ! ' 

Understand  well  that  I  do  not  disallow  sorrow ; 
it  has  its  appointed  time  and  work,  but  when 
that  is  over,  let  it  go  ;  it  is  a  hireling,  and  re- 
maineth  not  in  the  house  forever  ;  but  the  son 
remaineth  ever,  —  and  the  son  is  Isaac,  a  son 
of  laughter.  Nothing  appears  to  me  more  shal- 


72  TWO  FRIENDS. 

low,  than  the  mode  of  viewing  life  which  looks 
upon  pain  '  as  the  deepest  thing  in  our  nature, 
and  union  through  pain  the  closest  of  any.' 
Sorrow  is  essentially  separative.  What  is  its  ex- 
tremest  form  —  insanity  —  but  isolation?  The 
French,  with  as  much  truth  as  tenderness,  call 
the  insane  les  alienes.  The  mind,  broken  in 
itself,  has  lost  the  power  of  blending  with  other 
minds  ;  its  action  returns  upon  itself.  Joy  is  a 
uniting  thing  ;  it  builds  up,  while  it  enlarges, 
the  whole  nature  ;  it  is  the  wine  to  strengthen 
man's  heart,  to  brace  it  to  every  noble  enter 
prise.  Schiller's  crown  was  well  won  with  that 
one  saying,  4  Was  ist  dem  CrlucJclichen  zu 
schwer?'" 

"  '  Res  severa  est  verum  gaudiumj  "  said  Philip. 
"I  have  sometimes  thought,  that,  as  regards 
spiritual  things,  we  shall  not  arrive  at  this, 
the  bringing  in  of  the  sacrifices  of  joy,  except 
through  a  fuller  realization  of  our  organic  unity 
in  Christ.  Gladness  can  scarcely  be  a  solitary 
thing,  the  very  life  of  praise  seems  choral,  it  is 
more  than  one  bounded  heart  can  utter.  Its 
finest  expressions  are  those  that,  in  the  Psalms, 


TWO  FRIENDS.  73 

and  some  ancient  Canticles,  call  on  Nature,  even 
that  which  is  not  conscious  and  animate,  to  swell 
its  harmony :  — 

'  0  ye  showers  and  dew,  praise  ye  the  Lord ! ' 

Once,  even  in  music,  I  was  content  with  mel 
ody  ;  a  tune,  with  its  sweetness,  like  that  of  a 
tinkling  rill,  was  enough  to  gladden  me;  now 
my  heart  asks  for  a  deeper  spell.  Surely  when 
one  has  once  entered  into  the  blissful  secrets  of 
harmony,  the  note  seems  to  suggest  the  chord, 
to  ask  to  be  built  up  within  it." 

"  What  you  say  reminds  me  of  a  strange 
pleasure,  the  intense  consciousness  of  existence, 
which  one  sometimes  feels  in  a  crowd,  especially 
if  that  crowd  be  animated  by  one  common  feel 
ing,  and  that  of  an  exalting  kind.  Life  seems 
lifted  out  of  its  ordinary  conditions,  as  if  in  the 
whole  it  recovered  something  which  the  part  had 
missed.  Does  the  heart  in  these  moments  re 
claim  some  wide  affinity,  and  ask  to  be  built 
within  the  human  chord  ?  " 

u  I  think,"  said  Philip,  "  there  is  some  feel 
ing  akin  to  this  in  the  pleasure  which  exten- 

4 


74  TWO  FRIENDS. 

sion  gives,  something  which  intensifies  feeling, 
through  bringing  within  it  the  sense  of  infinity, 
as  when  we  gaze  over  any  great  reach  of  coun 
try,  with  the  cattle  upon  a  thousand  hills,  or 
across  the  sea,  with  ships  dropping  under  the 
rim  of  the  horizon.  In  the  sight  of  any  great 
town  from  some  little  distance,  or  in  looking 
down  at  evening  upon  some  sheltered  hamlet, 
what  a  deep  and  tender  sentiment  steals  across 
the  mind  !  We  know  that  the  city  is  not  the 
Celestial  one,  neither  is  the  village  Arcadian,  yet 
the  impression  left  upon  the  heart  is  one  of 
peace,  '  Peace  and  good-will  with  all  mankind.' 
Breadth  always  imparts  the  feeling  of  serenity  ; 
all  that  is  narrow  and  contradictory  melts  away 
in  it. 

'  Colors  laid 

Upon  the  canvas  oft  the  sense  invade 
Too  suddenly,  and  wound  the  aching  eye ; 
Yet  when  did  aught  beneath  the  open  sky 
Seem  harsh  or  violent  ?    So  sun  and  shade 
Attemper  all.' 

Even  so  in  contemplating  men,  say  soldiers, 
weavers,  colliers,  in  a  collective  body,  we  feel 
the  heart  drawn  out  in  a  deeper  sympathy  and 


TWO  FRIENDS.  75 

interest,  which  none  among  them,  perhaps,  as 
individuals,  would  command.  I  have  felt  this 
strongly  without  being  able  to  analyze  it." 

"  Does  it  not  arise  from  being  brought  writhiii 
the  influence  of  the  broad  tendencies  of  human 
ity,  where  individual  limitations  disappear,  swept 
away  by  the  force  of  the  current?  Such  mo 
ments  say  to  us,  '  Behold  the  Man  ! '  —  they 
are  baptismal,  and  endue  the  soul  with  much 
strength.  The  slender  stream  of  individual  life 

O 

is  choked  by  many  rocks  and  rapids  ;  the  strong 
est  heart  knows  that  there  are  stones  upon  which 
it  has  already  fallen  and  been  broken,  that  bar 
riers  are  before  it  never  to  be  wholly  overpast ; 
therefore  it  loves  to  hope,  to  strive  for  the 
many.  Passion,  interest,  caprice,  belong  to  the 
individual,  and  in  this,  surely,  lies  the  strength  of 
the  saying,  Vox  populi,  vox  Dei,  that  a  number 
of  persons  acting  together  are  naturally  less 
under  the  control  of  circumstance,  4  this  world's 
unspiritual  God,'  are  less  fettered  by  prejudice, 
than  the  few.  Also  we  know  that  in  every 
lump  there  is  a  leaven  of  nobleness,  some, 
perhaps  many,  tender  and  truthful  souls.  The 


76  TWO  FRIENDS. 

heart  of  a  people,  if  it  could  but  speak,  is  always 
in  its  right  place." 

"  And  it  is  this,"  said  Philip,  "  that  makes  all 
that  belongs  to  national  existence,  the  songs,  the 
customs  upon  which  the  life  of  a  people  has 
left  its  stamp,  so  interesting,  so  unspeakably 
affecting." 

"  And  it  is  this,  too,"  I  continued,  "  which 
gives  such  a  double  dye  to  all  sins  against  na 
tional  freedom,  which  is  but  the  expression  of  a 
people's  life.  If  it  is  a  crime  to  slay  a  man, 
what  must  it  be  to  strike  at  a  nation ;  to  kill 
man  in  his  organic  life;  to  cut  the  nerves  of 
universal  endeavor  ;  to  aim  at  man's  heart 
through  those  relations  with  his  fellow-men, 
which  are  the  veins  through  which  his  life-blood 
flows,  in  which  alone  he  can  live  and  move  and 
have  his  secular  being  ?  Slavery  stabs  man  both 
in  his  individual  and  in  his  organic  life,  and  every 
minor  degree  of  oppression  is  the  snapping  of  a 
bond  which  knits  one  man  to  his  fellows,  and 
the  whole  man  to  God.  The  oppressed  man 
does  not  live.  There  are  no  crimes  so  great  as 
political  crimes.  To  break  faith  with  a  nation 


TWO  FRIENDS.  77 

is  to  break  a  deeper  trust,  to  blight  a  fuller  hope, 
than  can  be  involved  in  any  treachery  towards 
an  individual.  Who  is  this,  the  true  Antichrist, 
he  that  denieth  the  Father  and  the  Son,  but  the 
absolutist,  the  tyrant  ?  We  are  not  surely  suf 
ficiently  sensible  of  the  Atheism  involved  in  the 
deep  iniquity  of  oppression.  It  is  the  denial  of 
God,  through  the  denial  of  man ;  the  setting  up 
of  what  is  partial  and  arbitrary  against  that 
which  is  universal ;  in  other  words,  the  assertion 
of  will  against  law." 

11  The  Lord  is  the  Spirit,  and  where  the  Spirit 
of  the  Lord  is  there  is  liberty,  because  there  only 
is  the  recognition  of  man's  spiritual  prerogative, 
the  freedom  of  the  will,  the  power  to  choose. 
All  rational  legislation  is  founded  upon  the  idea 
of  man's  being  a  governable  being,  and  this,  in 
its  turn,  rests  upon  the  basis  of  a  moral  and 
intelligent  Governor  of  the  world.  When  a 
community  has  lost  faith  in  God,  it  cannot 
achieve  freedom  for  man,  even  when  it  starts,  as 
in  the  French  Revolution,  with  being  fanatically 
in  love  with  it;  it  quickly  relapses  into  abso 
lutism,  and  the  governing  of  the  masses  by  force. 


78  TWO  FRIENDS. 

All  materialism  genders  to  bondage  ;  it  is  linked 
with  the  ideas  of  fate  and  necessity ;  they  are 
its  powers,  and  they  leave  room  for  but  one  wor 
ship,  that  of  the  God  of  Forces.  How  strange  it 
seems  that  the  idea  of  liberty  should  ever  be 
associated  with  that  of  lawlessness,  when,  in 
fact,  it  is  the  arbitrary,  which  is  really  unsettled 
and  reversible,  depending  on  the  breath  which 
called  it  forth.  All  national  greatness  requires 
that  which  can  only  coexist  with  freedom,  a  slow, 
safe  growth  under  assured  protection ;  law  not 
depending  on  power ,  but  power  being  founded 
upon  law" 

"  And  how  much,"  resumed  Philip,  "  is  the 
spirit  of  Freedom  connected  with  the  sentiment 
of  nationality !  A  slave  has  no  country,  no 
national  existence,  and  wherever  there  is  a 
strong  awakening  to  liberty,  it  does  not  find 
expression,  as  might  have  been  looked  for,  in  a 
broad  cosmopolitanism,  but  in  bringing  out  more 
fully  the  distinctive  physiognomy  of  each  people. 
When  a  nation  grows,  it  grows  as  an  individ 
ual  does,  in  its  own  shape.  I  sometimes  wonder 


TWO  FRIENDS.  79 

how  far  this  tendency  will  act  upon  the  future 
destinies  of  the  great  Church  of  Christ.  -  There 
is  nothing  more  evident  in  the  whole  history  of 
the  Church  of  Rome,  than  its  hostility  to  all  de 
velopment  of  a  national  kind,  its  determination 
to  mould,  at  whatever  cost,  the  European  world 
to  its  own  pattern." 

"  Will  it  any  longer,"  I  said,  "  receive  that 
pattern  ?  " 

"  I  know  not ;  but  Rome's  hand,  ever  firm 
linked  with  that  of  material  despotism,  cannot 
now,  in  the  nature  of  things,  lie  so  heavy  on  the 
nations,  as  in  the  days  when  these  two  gave 
their  power  and  strength  to  each  other.  Will 
the  breaking  up  of  Popery  be  connected  with 
the  rise  of  churches  really  national,  able  to  feed 
the  flocks  of  which  they  are  the  guardians; 
churches  built  upon  the  rock  of  Christ,  in  all 
that  concerns  faith  and  doctrine,  yet,  because 
Christ  lives,  living  also,  advancing  with  the  ad 
vancing  age,  able  to  understand  its  needs,  to  in 
terpret  its  aspirations,  to  give  it  back  those 
very  aspirations,  clothed  as  Aaron  was,  in  gar 
ments  of  glory  and  of  beauty,  —  churches  whose 


80  TWO  FRIENDS. 

priests,  like  those  of  old,  will  '  go  before '  the 
people?  It  seems  to  me  that  the  Church  of 
Scotland,  if  not  such  a  Church  as  this,  is  at 
least  a  national  Church,  fitting  the  national 
character,  so  that  it  is  hard  to  say  whether  it 
was  made  for  the  Scotch,  or  they  for  it ;  it  is  the 
educator  and  guide  of  the  people,  the  expres 
sion  of  their  intellectual  and  spiritual  life,  the 
home  of  the  poor  man's  affections  and  hopes. 
Such  also,  I  believe,  but  here  I  cannot  speak 
from  personal  observation,  is  Roman  Catholicism 
in  Ireland;  a  guide,  a  companion,  a  familiar 
friend,  that  to  which  the  national  heart  turns. 
In  England  the  Established  Church  has  missed 
this ;  it  has  not  won  the  heart  of  the  poor." 

"  And  yet,"  I  said,  "  the  Church  of  England 
also  represents  England,  and  perhaps  in  that 
aspect  of  it,  which  falls  short  of  what  exalted 
minds  desire,  it  illustrates  a  very  valuable  part 
of  the  national  character.  The  tendency  of  the 
English  mind  is  practical,  it  is  not  remorseless 
in  its  logical  requirements ;  it  is  content  to  leave 
many  things  as  it  finds  them,  undetermined, 
to  work  with  them  as  they  are.  The  English 


TWO  FRIENDS.  81 

mind  has  never  shown  itself  in  love  with  an 
ideal ;  in  political  things  it  has  never  drawn 
forth  the  image  of  liberty,  in  clear  abstract  per 
fection,  as  the  French  have  done.  Freedom 
does  not  sit  for  her  picture  in  England.  Why 
should  she,  when  we  have  her  going  in  and  out 
among  us,  a  daily  household  friend,  whose  fea 
tures  are  too  familiar  to  be  much  noticed  ?  So 
in  the  things  of  God,  the  English  mind  is  one 
that  must  have  room.  It  sees  that  the  Bible  is 
not  a  systematic  book,  neither  is  the  Church  a 
symmetrical  building,  nor  the  exigencies  of  the 
human  spirit  of  the  kind  that  can  be  sounded 
by  line,  or  mapped  out  by  compass,  and  it  does 
not  insist  upon  making  them  what  they  are 
not." 

"In  individuals,"  said  Philip,  "I  can  see  how 
the  very  desire  for  completeness  springs  from  a 
limited  view  of  life,  from  failing  to  see  how 
great,  complicated,  and  out-reaching  a  thing  it 
is.  To  minds  of  this  class  all  truth  appears 
under  a  strict  and  absolute  aspect,  to  which  life 
as  it  is  cannot  respond ;  this,  joined  to  a  pure 
and  rigid  conscientiousness,  gives  you  the  man 


82  TWO  FRIENDS. 

who,  like  Lamennais,  breaks  not  only  the  whole 
purpose  of  his  life,  but  his  heart  itself,  over  his 
fair,  unfound  ideal.  Among  all  nations,  the 
English,  as  you  say,  have  least  of  this,  and  of 
that  which  goes  along  with  it,  a  tendency  to 
fanaticism,  where  the  mind  is  so  driven  up  to  a 
single  truth,  as  to  seek  to  explain  all  nature  by 
it,  wrenching,  lopping  off  whatever  does  not, 
will  not,  fit.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  we  miss 
in  some  degree  what  the  more  ardent,  if  more 
limited,  nature  arrives  at,  —  that  which  makes 
martyrs,  missionaries." 

"  And  yet,"  I  said,  "  even  here  we  have  not 
been  found  wanting,  and  shall  not  be.  There 
is  a  practical  enthusiasm,  and  this  is  ours ;  an 
energy  which  will  not  kindle  up  for  an  abstract 
truth,  but  which,  once  convinced  of  the  motive 
excellence  of  such,  once  finding  it  work  towards 
a  tangible,  worthy  aim,  will  carry  it  out  with 
unflinching  perseverance.  All  that  the  English 
nation  needs  is  to  believe  more  implicity  than 
it  has  yet  done,  and  then  it  will  work  wonders. 
It  is  now  high  noon  with  us ;  what  we,  with  the 
universal  Church,  need,  is  the  midday  miracle, 


TWO  FRIENDS.  83 

the  Light,  like  that  which  appeared  unto  Saul 
of  Tarsus,  above  the  brightness  of  the.  sun,  in 
the  clear  conviction  of  the  understanding,  the 
full  consent  of  the  will,  the  turning  of  the  heart 
to  God,  whose  Word  endureth  forever  in 
heaven.  When  we  believe  in  miracles,  when  we 
expect  them,  then  we  shall  see  them,  then  we  shall 
work  them,  and  not  until  then" 

"  Some  years  ago,"  said  Philip,  "  I  read  some 
interesting  tracts  on  Church  subjects  by  a  Mr. 
Applegarth,  in  which  he  remarked  that  there 
had  always  been  a  lurking  Pelagianism  in  the 
Church  of  England.  I  did  not  understand  at 
the  time  what  he  meant ;  but  since  then  I  have 
seemed  to  discover  this  tendency,  in  its  remark 
able  deadness  to  the  gifts  and  calling  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  Any  drawing  to  a  closer  and  more  devot 
ed  walk  with  Christ  is  apt  to  be  set  down  to  the 
score  of  enthusiasm,  and  is  not  recognized,  as  I 
think  it  is  in  almost  every  other  communion,  as 
coming  from  God.  Witness  the  pertinacious 
attachment  of  Presbyterianism  to  its  '  called ' 
ministry,  the  'leadings  '  of  Quakers  and  Mora 
vians,  the  '  vocation  '  of  the  Church  of  Rome. 


84  TWO  FRIENDS. 

There  is  a  timidity  and  half-heartedness  about 
us  in  this  matter,  which  is  unworthy  of  what  we 
are  in  others ;  a  want  of  clearly  recognizing  the 
consequences  of  those  great  spiritual  facts  which 
we  speculatively  accept  as  true. 

"  And  I  think  the  same  timidity  and  want  of 
confidence  in  a  Divine  leading  is  shown  in  our 
superstitious  dread  of  discussion  and  alteration. 
A  people  that  believes  the  Bible  to  be  from  God 
will  not  fear  to  appeal  often  and  searchingly  to 
human  reason  ;  a  Church  that  believes  in  the 
Trinity  will  not  be  very  jealous  to  retain  the 
Athanasian  Creed.  In  true  faith  there  is  noth 
ing  of  a  vice-like,  mechanical  grasp  ;  its  hold  is 
firm  and  free ;  because  it  holds  with  the  living 
hand,  it  can  afford  to  let  go  what  it  no  longer 
needs,  while  Formalism  is  like  the  false  mother 
in  Solomon's  judgment,  it  cares  not  whether  the 
child  be  alive  or  dead,  so  long  as  it  is  there,  to 
be  shown  when  it  is  asked  for.  It  seems  ad 
mitted  now  on  all  hands,  that  our  Church  would 
gain  much  by  adaptation  and  elasticity ;  shorter 
and  more  varied  services,  a  fuller  recognition  of 
the  services  of  the  laity,  would  do  much  to  en- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  85 

dear  her  to  the  people.  Yet  we  run  on  in  the 
accustomed  groove.  The  most  difficult  -chapters 
from  the  Old  Testament  are  constantly  read  in 
our  churches ;  but  when  the  sermon  comes,  it 
contains  no  word  of  comment,  of  explanation ;  it 
makes  no  attempt  to  throw  light  upon  those  yet 
more  difficult  passages  of  human  experience,  to 
which  our  hearts,  our  homes,  every  hour  bear 
witness,  and  which  it  is  the  glory  of  the  Gospel 
to  reconcile :  it  is  generally  the  Gospel  unap 
plied.  The  views  which  are  presented  to  us  are 
true,  but  brought  into  no  relation  with  what  we 
are  doing  or  thinking  about.  God's  commands 
are  as  little  arbitrary  as  they  are  grievous  ;  there 
is  in  the  two  Sacraments,  in  Prayer,  in  all  things 
ordained  by  Him,  a  rationale :  why  not  some 
times  present  us  with  it  ?  " 

"  One  thing,"  returned  Philip,  "  is  abundantly 
significant  of  our  present  time  ;  it  will  not,  as 
former  ages  have  done,  rest  under  the  shadow 
of  forms  and  creeds  in  which  it  does  not  believe. 
In  reading  the  history  of  those  times,  you  must 
have  been  struck  with  the  real,  yet  wholly  un- 
vivifying  belief,  which  people  of  the  most  evil 


86  TWO  FRIENDS. 

hearts  and  lives  kept  upon  the  great  central 
truths  of  revelation,  and  this  in  the  case  of  both 
Catholics  and  Protestants.  A  trebly-dyed  mur 
derer,  like  Leicester,  commends  himself  in  his 
will  ;  to  the  alone  merits  of  Jesus  Christ,'  with 
a  fervor  which  is  not  quite  hypocrisy,  but  some 
thing  which  is,  I  think,  even  more  fearful.  Noth 
ing  is  to  me  more  strange  and  appalling  than 
their  general  acceptance  of  these  truths  as  math 
ematical  certainties,  as  things  laid  alongside  of 
their  actual  life,  without  ever  touching  or  quick 
ening  their  spiritual  consciousness.  I  have  seen 
something  of  this  in  a  less  repulsive  form  among 
the  poor  of  our  own  age,  —  belief  and  conscience 
running  on  in  two  parallel  lines  which  never 
meet ;  also,  among  people  of  the  last  generation, 
a  belief  in  revelation,  and  a  respect  for  it,  which 
is  not  vivifying,  and  yet  is  belief,  if  not  faith. 
But  we  do  not,  cannot,  so  accept  these  eternal 
verities.  Our  age  needs  more,  asks  more.  Its 
Church  must  be  a  sheltering  tree,  stretching  out 
her  boughs  unto  the  river,  and  her  branches 
unto  the  sea;  not  a  pyramid,  however  awful 
and  venerable,  that  does  but  cast  a  shadow  across 


TWO  FRIENDS.  87 

the  desert.  How  significant  are  the  notices,  that 
now  reach  us,  from  those  who  are  famrliar  with 
the  signs  of  spiritual  life  on  the  Continent ! 
Materialism  making  rapid  strides,  both  in  Prot 
estant  and  Romish  countries ;  persons  of  the 
class  who  would  formerly  have  lived  under  the 
forms  of  religion,  without  being  influenced  by  its 
power,  are  now  rejecting  it  as  a  whole,  professing 
open  disbelief  in  all  save  that  which  can  be  seen 
and  experienced ;  denying  the  capability  of  man 
to  know  anything  of  the  unseen  world.  And 
yet,  alongside  of  this,  in  Protestant  and  Romish 
countries  alike,  is  growing  up  a  counter  move 
ment  ;  sometimes  shown,  as  in  part  of  the  Lu 
theran  Church,  in  a  return  and  a  passionate 
attachment  to  the  old  forms  and  creeds,  which 
are  now  to  it  things  having  and  giving  life  ; 
sometimes  appearing  under  less-defined  outlines ; 
a  soul,  perhaps,  that  still  wants  a  body  to  work 
in  ;  a  desire  of  the  heart  towards  Christ  and  his 
appearing.  There  is  at  present  a  sifting  of  the 
nations,  and  when  it  is  over,  this  that  cannot  be 
shaken  will  remain.  It  sometimes  seems  to  me 
that  we  are  on  the  verge  of  a  great  constructive 


88  TWO  FRIENDS. 

era.  Men  are  beginning  to  repair  the  old  wastes, 
the  desolations  of  many  generations.  The  Crit 
ical  is  now  having  its  day ;  we  may  compare  its 
work  to  that  clearing  away,  which  is  the  first 
sign  of  improvement ;  but  its  day  must  pass,  as 
nothing  of  a  simply  negative  kind  can  be  lasting. 
Then  comes  a  glad  rebuilding,  of  which  I  can 
but  prophesy  dimly  ;  but  I  foresee  that  the  per 
son  and  work  of  Christ  will  be  its  centre. 

"  And  '  He,  when  he  is  lifted  up,  will  draw 
all  men  unto  him.'  Is  there  not  among  us  a 
manifest  desire  for  union,  an  impatience  of  those 
Shibboleths,  those  inner  tests,  which,  in  Protes 
tant  countries,  tend  to  needless  exclusivism  and 
separation  ;  an  impatience  with  all  that,  like  the 
arrogant  pretensions  of  Rome,  making  itself 
alone  in  the  earth,  renders  equal  communion 
and  reciprocal  interchange  impossible  ?  Is  there 
not  now  among  us  a  core  of  vital  religion,  a 
hidden  Church  waiting  as  a  fruit-tree  in  spring 
will  wait  long,  all  set  with  blossom,  for  a  day 
warm  enough  to  blow  in,  a  day  when  it  will  blow 
all  at  once  ?  " 


OMETTMES,"  said  Philip,  «  calling 
many  tendencies  of  our  age  to  mind, 
I  wonder  whether,  as  regards  spirit 
ual  science,  our  future  may  not  be  more  synthet 
ical  than  any  past  age  has  been ;  will  there  not 
be  less  of  analysis,  of  separation,  —  a  greater 
disposition  to  look  at  things  in  their  mutual  re 
lation  ?  The  study  of  natural  science  is  ever 
tending  to  form  this  habit  of  mind  within  us." 

"  So  much  so,"  I  said,  "  that  even  in  art  we 
can  scarcely  now  be  satisfied  with  that  which 
does  not,  at  least  by  implication,  present  us  with 
something  of  the  whole.  Whatever  is  painted 
lovingly,  whether  broadly  or  minutely,  does 
this.  David  Cox  flings  you  down  a  page  of 
nature  in  writing,  scarcely  legible  from  emotion ; 
rough,  blurred  lines  bring  before  you  the  wet 


90  TWO  FRIENDS. 

reaches  of  sand,  the  ever-widening  moor,  the 
darkening  sky,  the  wind  blowing  where  it  list- 
eth,  and  make  you  feel  as  if  you  were  among 
them,  bound  within  the  wings  of  sadness, 
beauty,  and  mystery,  and  carried  you  know  not 
whither.  So  will  one  of  W.  Hunt's  moss- 
grown,  leafy,  primrose-studded  hedge-banks 
give  you  the  breath  and  bloom  of  spring,  the 
sense  of  the  woods  and  fields,  and  of  the  broad 
open  sky,  within  the  compass  of  a  few  square 
inches.  But  there  is  a  way  of  depicting  nature 
and  life,  which,  because  we  feel  that  it  is  not 
true  to  the  whole,  satisfies  the  understanding  as 
little  as  it  delights  the  heart;  it  takes  feature 
by  feature,  and  yet  the  picture  is  not  like,  be 
cause  the  expression  —  that  which  belongs  to  the 
whole,  and  cannot  be  had  without  it  —  is  not 
there.  Thackeray,  for  instance,  takes  up  some 
fair  and  cherished  ideal  of  humanity,  pulls  it  in 
pieces,  and  says,  '  You  thought  this  was  a  lovely, 
breathing  form ;  you  loved  it,  mourned  over  it, 
but  see,  it  is  a  doh1  ;  it  never  lived,  its  eyes  are 
glass,  I  can  show  you  the  wires  by  which  they 
open  and  shut.  This  withered  flower  that  you 


TWO  FRIENDS.  91 

have  kept  within  your  heart's  book  so  long, 
that  its  leaves  still  open  at  the  place  where  it  is 
pressed,  is  not  a  flower ;  it  never  drank  in  the 
dew,  or  spread  its  leaves  in  the  sunshine.  Your 
treasure  is  a  thing  of  shreds  and  patches,  held 
together  by  a  little  gum.'  Yet  life  is  still  beau 
tiful  and  beloved.  Love  and  truth  and  con 
stancy,  all  things  the  human  heart  believes  in, 
remain ;  and  that  heart  is  still  greater  than  the 
things  which  do  surround  it,  able,  if  fair  and 
noble  things  were  not,  to  create  them  out  of  its 
own  wealth." 

"  The  whole,"  resumed  Philip,  "  interprets 
to  us  the  parts,  more  surely  than  the  parts  the 
whole,  so  that  to  judge  of  any  great  or  good 
thing  fairly  we  must  have  the  whole  before  us, 
we  must  even  presuppose  it,  in  order  to  a  just 
conception  of  the  parts.  To  get  a  true  idea  of 
any  character  or  system,  we  must  seize,  as  Nean- 
der  advises,  upon  its  higher  forming  element ; 
I  would  even  go  further  than  he  does,  and  say 
that  we  cannot  understand  the  Actual  of  a  char 
acter  or  system  without  in  some  degree  entering 
into  its  Ideal,  that  to  which  it  naturally  tends. 


92  TWO  FRIENDS. 

For  there  is  in  all  things  an  Ideal,  a  Divine 
principle,  revealing  itself  in  spite  of  contradic 
tory  elements,  something  which  it  would  fain 
be,  yet  which  it  only  can  be  in  a  sudden,  transi 
tory  flash ;  as  an  ordinary  face  will  in  some  mo 
ment  of  satisfied  affection,  of  exalted  feeling,  be 
transfigured  into  beauty  and  nobleness.  Who 
has  not  known  moments  when  the  whole  of  a 
friend's  heart  has  been  in  his  looks  and  voice ; 
moments  in  which  a  lifetime  of  goodness  and 
affection  has  revealed  itself,  perhaps  at  the  touch 
of  some  slight  and  apparently  casual  circum 
stance?  And  I  think  it  is  for  this  that  the 
general  heart  of  humanity  has  been  ever  dis 
posed  to  set  such  a  seemingly  disproportionate 
value  upon  sudden  acts  of  self-sacrifice  and 
heroic  daring,  deeds  like  those  of  the  Chevalier 
d' Assas,  —  that  though  they  occupy  but  a  mo 
ment,  the  whole  of  a  life  is  in  them.  Moments 
of  sudden  emergency  leave,  it  is  true,  no  time 
for  choice,  for  reflection,  for  much  that  makes 
an  action  morally  great ;  but  they  are  like  the 
lightning's  flash  across  the  spirit,  bringing  out 
its  lineaments  in  clear  and  awful  distinctness. 


TWO  FRIENDS.  93 

Such  deeds  give  us  a  great  soul  speaking  in  its 
unguarded  sleep,  showing  us  what  it  truly  is. 
And  the  less  exalted  aspects  of  life  have  also  at 
a  lower  level  their  consistency ;  the  whole  tree 
is  in  its  every  leaf;  the  whole  body ,. soul,  and 
spirit  of  man  is  in  some  degree  in  his  every 
action.  When  a  person  is  known  intimately, 
each  of  his  movements  and  gestures  bears  a 
characteristic  stamp ;  even  a  garment  he  has 
worn  becomes  instinct  with  life  and  individu 
ality  ;  it  suggests  the  familiar  face,  it  is  filled  out 
with  the  well-known  form.  This,  we  say,  be 
longs  to  him.  So  may  God  be  discerned  in  Hu 
manity,  so  may  Christ  be  seen  in  his  Church." 

"  And  yet,"  I  said,  "  as  regards  this  last 
great  subject,  how  poor,  insufficient,  and  there 
fore  practically  inefficient,  are  our  conceptions  ! 
The  Bible,  as  De  Maistre  says,  clearly  intimates 
that  the  Church  is  as  necessary  to  Christ  as  he 
is  to  the  Church ;  it  is  emphatically  the  fulness 
of  him  who  filleth  all  in  all.*  This  wonderful 
saying  shows  us  that  unity  is  the  end  of  all  the 
Divine  plans  with  regard  to  us.  Even  Christ  is 

*  Ephesians  i.  23. 


94  TWO  FRIENDS. 

only  complete  through  the  building  up  of  his 
body,  the  Church  :  we  are  complete  in  him  ;  he 
is  completed  in  us.  His  words  are  not  only 
4  You  in  me,'  but  also,  '  I  in  you ' :  the  Head  of 
the  great  body  says  not  to  any  one  of  his  mem 
bers,  '  I  have  no  need  of  thee.'  The  Epistles 
are  full  of  references  to  the  organic  life  of  the 
Church ;  the  building  '  up  of  this  breathing 
house  not  made  with  hands '  is  spoken  of  as  a 
gradual  work,  —  a  work  which  moves  alto 
gether,  if  it  moves  at  all;  the  whole  body,  St. 
Paul  tells  us,  grows  through  that  which  every 
joint  supplieth.  They  also  testify  to  a  common, 
a  transferable  spiritual  property ;  a  bread  some 
times  of  affliction,  sometimes  of  rejoicing,  of 
which  4  all  are  partakers.'  '  If  we  be  afflicted,' 
says  St.  Paul,  'it  is  for  your  salvation  which 
is  wrought  in  the  enduring  of  the  same  suffer 
ings  which  we  also  suffer,  or  whether  we  be 
comforted,  it  is  for  your  consolation  and  salva 
tion.'  4  We  also,'  he  says  again,  '  are  weak  in 
Christ,  but  we  shall  live  by  the  power  of  God 
toward  you.'  He  speaks  further  of  individual 
poverty,  which  tends,  and  not  indirectly,  to 


TWO  FRIENDS.  95 

the  general  wealth,  '  We  are  fools  for  Christ's 
sake,  but  ye  are  wise  in  Christ ;  we  are  weak, 
but  ye  are  strong ' ;  and  intimates  that  the 
prayers  of  4  many  helping  together  '  will  bring 
upon  Timothy  and  himself  a  blessing  for  which 
*  many '  will  return  thanks.  Nay,  he  does  not 
even  limit  this  reciprocal  interchange,  this  mu 
tual  interest  and  help,  to  the  members  of  the 
human  family,  whether  militant  on  earth  or 
rejoicing  in  heaven.  How  many  of  his  deep 
sayings,  such  as  Col.  i.  20,  Eph.  i.  10,  imply 
that  the  benefits  of  Christ's  great  sacrifice  have 
a  bearing  beyond  that  family,  such  as  bring  it 
into  relations  with  other  and  spiritual  orders 
of  existence.  Who  knows  upon  what  worlds, 
what  systems,  Christian  prayer  and  effort  even 
now  tells  ?  It  was  not  to  men  only  that  St. 
Paul's  commission  was  addressed.  He  preached 
among  them  the  unsearchable  riches  of  Christ, 
to  the  intent  that  the  manifold  wisdom  of  God 
might  be  made  known  to  principalities  and 
powers  in  heavenly  places  through  the  Church 
which  was  thus  founding.  See  Eph.  iii.  10. 
4  The  fellowship  of  the  mystery '  he  there  speaks 


96  TWO  FRIENDS. 

of  is  a  mystery  of  fellowship,  one  that  fellowship 
only  can  admit  us  to." 

"  You  have  quoted  De  Maistre,"  said  Philip, 
thoughtfully ;  "  do  not  these  expressions,  at 
least  in  the  sense  in  which  you  receive  them, 
—  and  I  do  not  see  how  they  will  bear  any 
other,  —  come  very  near  his  favorite  theory 
of  reversibility  ?  " 

"  Not  nearer,"  I  returned,  "  than  Baxter 
comes,  when  he  speaks  of  his  own  times  a  truth 
that  holds  good  of  all :  '  It  is  because  we  have 
so  few  high  saints  among  us,  that  we  have  so 
many  low  sinners,'  and  not  nearer  certainly 
than  life  itself  comes.  In  the  meanest  thing  of 
every  day,  no  man  liveth,  no  man  dieth  unto 
himself,  so  inwrapt  and  interfolded  are  human 
destinies  in  the  continual  action  and  reaction 
that  goes  on  through  life.  And  if  it  is  thus 
with  the  outward  course  of  things,  dealing  with 
what  is  material  and  secular,  how  much  more  so 
in  that  great  unseen  order  where  finer  springs 
are  touched  to  surer  issues,  the  spiritual  life  of 
man !  The  Christian  is  one  who  in  wrork  and 
life  and  prayer  4  strengthens  himself  for  the 


TWO  FRIENDS.  97 

sake  of  many ;  he  belongs  consciously  to  a  king 
dom  in  which  there  is  nothing  unrelated.", 

"  True,"  said  Philip,  "  and  a  time  comes  to 
the  soul  when  individualism  becomes  cramping, 
narrowing ;  when  we  feel  conscious  that  we 
cannot  breathe  and  move  freely  either  in  work 
or  prayer,  except  through  the  universal  organic 
whole." 

"  What,"  I  resumed,  "  is  Christianity  itself, 
but  living  to  the  whole  instead  of  living  to  the 
part  f  It  gives  the  heart  Christ  instead  of  self 
for  its  spring  and  centre ;  it  says  unto  it,  4  Be 
hold  the  Man ' ;  not  Paul  now,  nor  Apollos, 
not  even  Christ  Jesus  himself  as  a  man ;  if  we 
have  known  him  as  such  in  a  merely  personal 
relation,  we  know  him  as  such  no  more,  but  as 
the  great  High-Priest  standing  before  Crod  in 
the  place  of  humanity,  whose  sins,  whose  griefs, 
and  burdens,  he  has  taken  upon  himself,  first 
born  among  many  brethren.  Ecce  Homo  !  the 
earliest  impression  I  ever  received  of  Christ  was 
from  a  colored  engraving,  with  these  words  be 
neath  it ;  I  remember  distinctly  the  place  where 
it  used  to  hang ;  the  crown  of  thorns,  the  bleed- 
5  o 


98  TWO  FRIENDS. 

ing  forehead,  the  kind  and  sorrowful  counte 
nance.  I  remember,  as  a  very  little  child, 
asking  what  the  two  Latin  words  meant ;  how 
long  have  I  been  in  learning  their  full  mean 
ing  !  Protestantism  has  done  much  for  the 
world  by  its  consistent  testimony  to  moral  re 
sponsibility,  by  its  faithful  education  of  the 
individual  spirit ;  but  from  the  exclusive  stress 
it  lays  upon  what  is  individual  and  interior, 
it  bears  but  feeble  witness  to  one  organic  spir 
itual  unity ;  to  the  fact  that  we,  being  many 
members,  are  one  body  in  Christ.  Roman 
Catholicism  has  loudly  proclaimed  this  unity; 
it  has  been  its  lot  to  keep  and  to  transmit  a 
secret  which  it  has  not  apparently  understood. 
It  has  testified  that  the  human  race,  whether 
in  Adam  or  in  Christ,  is  one;  but  it  has 
missed  the  contingent  necessary  truth,  that  be 
cause  we  are  one,  because  we  possess  organic 
life,  that  life  will  assume  different  manifesta 
tions.  All  that  lives  grows,  and  grows  after  its 
own  fashion ;  it  is  only  that  which  is  made, 
ready  made,  which  can  be  reproduced  a  thou 
sand  times  over,  in  any  age  or  in  any  clime,  in 


TWO  FRIENDS.  99 

the  order  and  pattern  desired.  This  truth, 
Popery,  waiting  from  age  to  age  to  devour 
the  man-child  of  mental  and  spiritual  freedom 
so  soon  as  it  should  be  born,  has  ignored,  has 
trampled  under  foot,  and  even  yet,  wherever 
Popery  continues  in  the  ascendant  there  can  be 
no  harmonious  development,  no  free,  progressive 
life,  none  of  that  mutual  help  and  enlighten 
ment,  each  supplying  what  each  needs,  which  is 
the  soul  and  life-breath  of  Church  fellowship. 
Stiff  with  its  own  infallibility,  the  Church  of 
Rome  sits  before  Christendom  like  the  enchan 
ter  before  the  lady  in  Comus,  ready  to  chain  up 
its  nerves  in  alabaster." 

"It  is  not  hard,  I  think,"  said  Philip,  "to 
contemplate  Catholicity  apart  from  Popery." 

"  And  in  that  case,"  I  continued,  "  not  hard 
to  see  how  Catholicity  still  holds  to  her  heart 
this  flower,  the  unity  of  man!  Often  has  its 
fragrance,  as  that  of  a  flower  cast  forth  to  perish, 
come  across  me  in  lonely  and  uncultured  places, 
making  the  desert  glad ;  here  only  I  find  it 
planted  in  the  garden  of  the  Lord,  and  drawing 
round  it,  as  thick  as  bees  in  summer,  every  ten- 


100  TWO  FRIENDS. 

der  and  hopeful  thought.  There  are  in  the 
world  many  kinds  of  voices,  and  none  of  them 
without  signification ;  wandering,  wind-awak 
ened  tones  seeming  to  die  upon  the  air  that  calls 
them  forth,  —  Liberty,  Equality,  Fraternity,  the 
sound  of  a  trumpet  and  the  voice  of  words. 
But  what  has  it  been  to  me  to  recognize  this 

O 

voice,  dear  in  the  poet's  song,  the  patriot's  vis 
ion,  —  sweet  even  in  its  most  bitter  accents, 
wrung  from  the  heart  of  some  stern,  solitary- 
thinker  grown  desperate  over  this  world's 
wrong ;  what  has  it  been  to  me  to  hear  it  speak 
ing  to  us  no  longer  in  parables,  but  showing  us 
plainly  of  the  Father  ?  What  but  the  awakening 
into  a  blissful  dream  ?  The  intellect  has  many 
illusions ;  but  the  dreams  of  the  heart  come 
true,  because  the  instinct  of  the  heart  is  pro 
phetic.  Catholicity,  or,  in  other  words,  apos 
tolic  Christianity,  is  the  fulfilment  of  the  heart's 
best  dream  ;  it  contemplates  humanity  as  one, 
and  as  such  aims  at  its  restoration;  as  One 
fallen  in  Adam,  as  One  redeemed  in  Christ ;  it 
works  ever  towards  the  whole,  its  task  is  to 
bring  back  the  One  to  the  One,  humanity  to 


TWO  FRIENDS.  101 

God.  It  looks  also  upon  the  individual  man  as 
one,  a  being  spiritual,  rational,  and  v sensitive, 
and  as  such  provides  him  with  food  convenient 
for  him  ;  it  gives  us  no  manna  of  mere  spiritu 
ality,  angels'  food,  thin  and  unsatisfying ;  but 
sets  before  us  bread,  —  the  bread  of  which  Christ 
said,  4  It  is  my  flesh,  which  I  will  give  for  the 
life  of  the  world.'  It  does  not  throw  the  whole 
strain  of  spiritual  life  upon  a  moment,  a  feeling, 
a  movement  of  the  heart,  of  which,  at  some 
other  moment  and  under  some  other  feeling,  the 
heart  itself  may  doubt ;  it  receives  us  while 
yet  passive  ;  unconscious  of  either  good  or  evil, 
it  takes  us  up  within  its  arms  to  bless  us.  It 
makes  not  upon  the  heart  that  continual,  ex 
haustive  demand,  '  Faith,  faith,'  but  lays  within 
it  faith's  deep  foundation ;  it  declares  of  our 
spiritual  Zion  that  this  Man  was  born  there, 
and  proclaims  that  the  Highest  doth  even  now 
inhabit  her  ;  it  brings  forth  the  headstone  with 
shoutings  of  '  Grace,  grace.'  ' 

"  Catholicity,"  said  Philip,  "  is  great  in  this, 
that  while  it  leaves  within  it  room  and  scope 
for  the  most  ardent  personal  aspiration,  for  the 


102  TWO  FRIENDS. 

closest  individual  union  with  Christ  that  the 
heart  can  claim,  it  does  not  leave  the  heart  to  it 
self,  to  its  own  experiences,  its  own  aspirations. 
It  regards  humanity  as  a  field  which  the  Lord 
hath  blessed,  as  a  soil  where  the  good  seed  is  al 
ready  sown,  and  needs  but  to  be  quickened  and 
developed.  It  brings  Christ  into  the  foreground 
of  spiritual  life,  and  lets  life  root  itself  round  his 
life.  It  lifts  before  the  soul  its  great  Object, 
that  which  alone  can  lift  it  up  ;  through  rite, 
through  creed,  through  symbol,  it  brings  the 
human  spirit  into  neighborhood  with  Christ,  and 
lets  it  grow  up  gradually  unto  him." 

u  Catholicity,"  I  continued,  "  requires  noth 
ing  from  the  individual  but  sincerity ;  its  con 
gregation,  like  that  of  the  Israelites,  are  all  holy 
de  jure  ;  all,  until  reprobate  and  self- excluded, 
are  citizens  of  no  mean  city.  They  have  noth 
ing  to  prove,  nothing  to  keep  up  before  men ; 
let  but  their  light  burn  unto  God,  it  may  take 
care  of  its  own  shining.  It  is  easy  to  see  how 
different  a  position  the  individual  holds  in  com 
munities  where  the  test  of  fellowship  is  inward, 
as  among  the  Baptist  and  other  of  the  stricter 


TWO  FRIENDS.  103 

Protestant  sects,  where  membership  in  Christ 
is  not  admitted  until  the  individual  lias  gone 
through  a  conscious  spiritual  change.  There, 
even  in  the  countenance,  you  can  often  trace 
a  painful  constraint  and  self-consciousness,  as 
of  persons  committed  to  a  standard  of  feeling 
which  they  may  not  be  at  all  times  equal  to 
maintain.  The  spirit  of  man,  we  all  know, 

'  Is  competent  to  win 
Heights  which  it  is  not  competent  to  keep.'  " 

"The  heart  of  man,"  said  Philip,  "is  too 
weak  to  be  forever  self-regulating.  Christ  is 
to  his  Church  what  the  sun  is  to  the  world,  — 
its  great  universal  clock,  to  which  the  whole 
system  is  so  adapted,  that  a  flower  opens  and 
shuts  to  the  same  law  by  which  the  heavenly 
bodies  move.  In  Catholicity  there  is  little  of 
stimulus  and  pressure ;  little  to  fear  from  those 
sharp  collapses  which  are  their  inevitable  result. 
It  lifts  the  strain  from  self  to  Christ ;  it  is  evi 
dently  made  for  man  ;  suited  for  Mm  as  he  is 
now.  But  is  there  not  also  something  beautiful 
in  the  Protestant  ideal  of  a  Church,  striving 


104  TWO  FRIENDS. 

as  it  does  to  antedate  the  time  when  God's 
people  shall  be  all  righteous  ?  Something  in  it, 
too,  which  answers  to  that  deep-seated  longing 
for  inner  purity,  that  desire  after  perfection, 
which  must,  as  things  are  at  present  constituted, 
ever  defeat  itself,  and  yet  ever  form  part  of  true 

Christian  consciousness  ? And  what,  after 

all,"  resumed  Philip,  thoughtfully,  "is  a  sect 
but  the  recognition  of  a  Church  ?  the  effort  to 
tighten  the  bonds  which,  in  the  great  national 
churches,  are  apt  to  hang  so  loosely  as  to  be 
scarcely  felt  ?  There  is  something  in  Chris 
tianity,  if  we  examine  its  history  closely,  which 
always  for  its  full  development  requires  an  inner 
circle,  a  church  within  the  church.  It  has 
found  this  in  the  Sect,  the  Order;  it  finds  it 
too,  in  many  an  English  parish,  in  a  humble, 
healthful,  almost  unsuspected  shape,  in  the  work 
which,  under  good  organization,  grows  up  nat 
urally  about  the  Church.  I  once  lived  in  a 
large  manufacturing  village,  where  a  numer 
ously  attended  Sunday  school  became  such  a 
spiritual  centre,  and  possessed  all  the  attractive, 
binding  energy  I  speak  of;  the  more  thought- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  105 

fill  persons  of  every  class  being  drawn  out  as 
teachers,  meeting  the  clergyman  for  prayer  and 
reading  of  the  Scriptures,  with  an  especial  refer 
ence  to  the  common  work  ;  while  these>  in  their 
turn,  influenced  the  more  seriously  disposed 
young  people,  to  whom  the  care  of  the  very 
little  ones  was  committed.  I  often  recall  these 
younger  teachers,  factory  boys  and  girls,  some 
of  them  even  unable  to  read  very  fluently,  yet 
most  successful  in  the  management  of  their 
infant  classes.  How  attached  they  were  to 
their  little  pupils,  visiting  them  when  sick,  and 
taking  them  various  small  comforts !  How 
affectionate  to  their  elder  friends  !  That  was 
the  only  place,"  said  Philip,  smiling,  "  where  I 
was  ever  serenaded !  My  boys  knew  my  fa 
vorite  hymns,  and  used  to  sing  them  under 
my  window  in  summer  evenings.  All  things 
seemed  to  unite  us  more  closely,  —  the  mirth 
of  our  yearly  festivals ;  the  happy  deaths  of 
some  among  us ;  even  the  sorrowful  fallings 
away  of  some  that  at  first  did  run  well;  the 
losses  belonging  to  every  great  gain  ;  the  dis 
appointments  inseparable  from  every  real  work : 

5* 


106  TWO  FRIENDS. 

in  all  things  we  were  as  members,  rejoicing  and 

suffering  together 

"  Again,  .  in  large  towns  you  will  find  an 
interest  in  the  great  Christian  societies,  such  as 
those  connected  with  foreign  missions,  or  active 
local  work  among  the  destitute  and  fallen,  work 
ing  the  same  effect  in  calling  forth  the  more 
intimate  spiritual  affections.  There  is  no  such 
firm,  such  attaching  bond,  as  that  of  prayer  and 
a  common  work  for  Christ.  A  common  work 
tends  to  a  common  life,  fuller  than  the  individual 
can  ever  live.  How  can  one,  being  alone,  be 
warm?  Do  you  remember  the  almost  secret 
associations  established  during  the  last  century, 
a  period  of  great  license  in  the  Nation,  and  of 
great  coldness  in  the  Church,  'for  the  refor 
mation  of  manners '  ?  —  societies  so  humble  in 
their  scope,  and  so  quiet  in  their  action,  that 
it  is  now  difficult  to  gather  any  exact  account 
of  them.  They  are  only  to  be  traced  back  in 
the  works  which  have  followed  them,  not  only 
discernible  in  'sweeter  manners,  purer  laws,' 
but  in  their  direct  historical  connection  with  the 
great  religious  and  missionary  societies  which 


TWO  FRIENDS.  107 

now  go  through  the  length  and  breadth  of  our 
land.  It  is  evident  that  our  spiritual  and  our 
natural  life  are  alike  in  this,  that  each  needs, 
from  time  to  time,  to  be  refreshed,  quickened, 
by  something  not  within  ourselves.  We  require 
the  reciprocal  action  of  heart  upon  heart,  life 
calling  forth  life.  Even  in  natural  things  there 
is  no  fulness  except  through  participation ;  and 
I  myself  have  been  long  persuaded  that  we  do 
not  fully  live  unto  Christ  except  through  mutual 
communion.  How  significant  is  that  saying  of 
St.  John's,  '  If  we  walk  in  the  light,  as  he  is  in 
the  light,  we  have  fellowship  one  with  another ' ! 
And  there  is  surely  a  mystery  in  our  Saviour's 
words,  '  Where  two  or  three  are  gathered 
together  in  my  name,  there  am  I  in  the  midst 
of  them.'  The  genius  of  the  old  Dispensation 
was  individual,  God  speaking  to  the  soul  of 
patriarch  and  prophet,  and  receiving  for  answer, 
4  Here  am  /.'  The  new  Covenant  knows  little 
of  solitary  manifestations.  When  Jesus  is  to  be 
transfigured,  he  taketh  with  him  Peter  and 
James  and  John ;  when  the  Holy  Spirit  is  to  be 
given,  the  disciples  are  all  assembled  with  one 
accord,  in  one  place." 


108  TWO  FRIENDS. 

As  I  looked  at  Philip,  and  saw  how  he 
warmed  and  almost  grew  with  his  great  theme, 
I  was  reminded  of  the  sermon  some  mediaeval 
divine  preached  upon  it  to  the  text,  "  Philip 
and  Bartholomew,"  the  last-named  of  these  two 
disciples  being  never  mentioned  in  Holy  Writ 
except  in  connection  with  the  former. 

"  And  there  is  yet  another  side,"  he  contin 
ued,  "  from  which  it  is  well  to  look  at  this  sub 
ject.  In  the  frequent  darkness  and  deadness 
of  the  human  spirit,  how  strange,  how  power 
fully  re-enforcing  is  the  influence  of  true  com 
munion  !  You,  I  know,  from  some  cheerfulness 
of  my  voice  and  aspect,  find  it  hard  to  think  of 
me  but  as  strong  and  equal ;  you  do  not  easily 
believe  that  I,  like  yourself,  am  visited  by 
moods  in  which  earth  seems  desolate,  and 
heaven  even  geographically  a  long  way  off,  with 
all  lines  of  communication  broken.  At  such 
seasons  how  does  one  desire  a  gale,  a  lift;  to  be 
taken  up  like  a  little  bird  under  the  wing  of  a 
strong  eagle,  and  brought  nearer  the  sun  !  But 
does  it  ever  come  to  you  to  suffer  under  an 
anguish  of  unbelief,  of  a  rational,  or  apparently 


TWO  FRIENDS.  109 

rational,  irresistible  kind,  when  some  dark,  be 
sieging  thought,  which  the  soul  can  neither 
answer  nor  dismiss,  comes  forward  in  a  form  so 
fixed  and  definite,  that  reason  seems  spell-bound 
before  it ;  and  though  the  heart  and  spirit  pro 
test,  it  is  so  feebly  as  to  appear  almost  like  con 
sent  ?  This  state  of  mind  is,  I  think,  the  hard 
est  of  all  to  bear,  because  it  is  one  which  leaves 
the  soul  no  place  to  flee  unto ;  it  is  hunted  from 
one  desolation  to  another.  I  shall  never  forget 
a  day  of  this  kind  last  summer ;  a  day  out 
wardly  of  golden  warmth  and  sweetness ;  of 
quiet,  too  ;  for  I  was  staying  in  my  old  parish 
in  the  country.  In  the  evening  a  few  of  my 
young  men,  Sunday  scholars  and  pupil-teachers, 
with  whom,  five  years  ago,  I  had  spent  many  a 
happy,  well-remembered  hour,  came  in  to  see 
and  welcome  me.  It  was  an  effort  to  me,  under 
such  circumstances,  to  appear  so  glad  to  see 
them  as  I  should  naturally  have  felt ;  a  still 
greater  effort  to  pass  into  any  intercourse  be 
yond  that  of  kindly  chat  and  greetings  ;  yet  I 
made  it,  and  we  had  reading  and  talk  and 
prayer  together  as  of  old.  I  cannot  describe  to 


110  TWO  FRIENDS. 

you  the  effect  this  little  hour  of  prayer  and  of 
true  communion  had  upon  me  ;  even  like  that 
of  the  bursting  of  a  dark  thunder-cloud,  and  it 
affected  me  in  this  way.  I  felt  that  Christ  and 
the  Holy  Spirit,  regeneration,  and  the  blessed, 
glorious  hopes  that  the  Gospel  holds  out  to  us, 
are  at  any  rate  as  real  as  the  gulfs  set  between 
man  and  all  that  he  seems  made  for,  —  sin,  indif 
ference,  despair,  —  as  real  as  all  that  had  per 
plexed  me  ;  these,  too,  are/acfc,  historic,  living 
facts,  met  and  answered  by  the  heart  to  which 
they  are  addressed,  meeting  our  deep  need.  At 
that  time  I  could  not  have  prayed  alone ;  a  wind 
from  the  desert,  a  dry,  searching  breath,  would 
have  swept  my  words  ;  I  needed  to  pass  out  of 
my  own  soul,  wasted  and  girt  with  fire,  into  the 
freedom  of  less  harassed  spirits.  Seasons  like 
these  have  made  me  think  much  on  the  subject 
of  communion  and  its  deep  inward  blessedness. 
To  know,  as  I  do,  looking  over  the  country  at 
this  moment,  till  my  eye  rests  upon  the  remote 
edge  of  the  horizon,  that  there  is  a  poor  man  or 
woman  living  there  who  believes,  and  loves,  and 
prays,  makes  me  a  happier,  abler  Christian.  To 


TWO  FRIENDS.  Ill 

borrow  an  illustration  from  nature,  do  you 
know  that  ice  cannot  change  to  water^  or  water 
to  steam,  until  the  temperature  of  the  whole 
has  been  raised  to  a  certain  level  ?  We  cannot 
raise  the  temperature  of  a  thawing  mass  of  ice 
until  we  have  thawed  the  whole  ;  until  all  the 
ice  has  passed  into  water,  all  the  water  into 
steam.  Any  heat  short  of  the  amount  required 
to  produce  these  changes  becomes  latent  and 
disappears  ;  it  is  absorbed  in  producing  these 
changes.  How  much  Christian  energy  and 
love  disappears,  sinks  below  the  surface,  in  this 
way,  depressed  by  the  low  level  of  the  sur 
rounding  atmosphere. 

"  As  the  world  is,  the  few  earnest  Christians 
scattered  here  and  there  in  it,  one  in  a  family, 
a  few  in  a  city,  are  enough  to  keep  the  mass 
from  freezing ;  but  their  life,  we  may  say,  is 
spent  in  keeping  up  their  life : 

'  A  flower  that,  bold  and  patient,  thrusts  its  way 
Through  stony  chinks,  lives  on  from  day  to  day, 
But  little  shows  of  fragrance  or  of  bloom.' 

How  sorely  in  social  life  will  the  want  of  gen 
erous  and  exalted  aims,  the  absence  of  lofty  and 


112  TWO  FRIENDS. 

kindly  traditions,  affect  a  whole  community ! 
It  is  hard  to  be  always  in  opposition  ;  even  the 
nobler  mind  will  in  some  degree  succumb  to 
what  it  continually  meets,  becoming,  like  the 
dyer's  hand,  '  subdued  to  that  it  works  in.' 
How  different  it  is  when  heart  is  met  by  heart, 
and  hand  helped  out  by  hand,  as  is  sometimes, 
if  too  seldom,  seen  in  a  household  that  have 
among  them  but  one  heart  and  one  mind,  and 
that  the  mind  which  was  in  Christ  Jesus  !  A 
home  wherein  earthly  affections,  without  losing 
their  characteristic  sweetness,  have  been  made 
to  bear  the  image  of  the  heavenly  ;  where  love 
between  child  and  parent,  between  husband  and 
wife,  has  been  transfigured  into  a  more  perfect 
likeness  ;  where  to  brotherly  kindness,  a  natural 
bond  which  is  strong,  but  not  always  tender,  has 
been  4  added '  the  spiritual  tie  of  charity.  What 
is  there  too  hard  for  such  a  family  to  undertake 
and  to  accomplish?" 

Philip  took  from  his  pocket-book  a  little 
prayer,  which  he  had  found,  he  told  me,  in  a 
very  old  collection  :  — 


TWO  FRIENDS.  113 

for  Cfwst's 


"  But  how  unthankful  I  am,  and  sorrowless,  Lord,  thou 
knowest,  for  my  heart  is  not  hid  from  thee.  0  be  merciful 
unto  me,  good  Father,  and  grant  me  the  Spirit  of  thy  chil 
dren,  to  reveal  unto  me  my  ignorance  of  thy  kingdom,  my 
poverty,  and  perversity,  that  I  may  lament  the  same,  and 
daily  labor  for  thy  help  and  thy  Holy  Spirit  to  suppress  the 
kingdom  of  sin  in  myself  and  others.  Again,  grant  me  that 
same,  thy  Holy  Spirit,  to  reveal  to  me  thy  kingdom  of  power, 
grace,  and  glory  ;  to  kindle  mine  affections  towards  it;  to 
renew  me  more  and  more  ;  to  reign  in  me  as  in  a  piece  of 
thy  kingdom  ;  to  give  me  to  desire,  to  pray,  and  to  labor  for 
thy  kingdom,  loth  to  myself  and  others  ;  that  the  power,  ex 
cellence,  and  majesty  of  thy  kingdom  may  be  known  among 
men" 

We  were  both  long  silent.  Philip  resumed  : 
"  Do  you  not  think  that  the  secret  of  the  ex 
traordinary  hold  of  Methodism  upon  the  English 
poor  lies  in  the  strict  and  intimate  communion 
which  forms  so  essential  a  part  of  it  ?  Before 
John  Wesley  commenced  that  great  revival 
of  spiritual  religion  which  was  blest  to  whole 
counties,  towns,  villages,  and  the  fruits  of  which 
are  still  to  be  found,  not  only  in  many  a  remote 
and  many  a  populous  district  in  England,  but 


114  TWO  FRIENDS. 

in  America,  Sweden,  and  almost  the  whole  of 
Protestant  Christendom,  he  describes  himself  as 
having  walked  many  miles  to  see  and  discourse 
with  '  a  serious  person,'  who  said  to  him,  '  You 
must  either  find  companions  or  make  them  ; 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  going  to  heaven 
alone.'  Methodism  is  eminently  social ;  its  idea 
is  that  of  journeying  Zion wards  in  companies, 
gathering  as  they  go  ;  husbands,  wives,  friends, 
servants,  little  ones,  '  leaving  not  a  hoof  be 
hind  '  ;  its  activities  are  ever  aggressive,  its 
sympathies  ever  widening  ; 

*  We  weep  for  those  who  weep  below, 

And  burdened,  for  the  afflicted  sigh; 
The  various  forms  of  human  woe 
Attract  our  softest  sympathy.'  " 

"  True,"  I  said,  "  I  know  no  more  singular 
contrast  than  to  turn,  as  I  have  lately  done, 
from  Wesley's  hymns  to  those  of  Augustus 
Toplady,  in  their  way  as  fine  as  any  in  our 
language,  but  admitting  us  into  a  world  in  which 
there  is  God  and  the  individual  soul  only  ;  no 
breath  or  whisper  to  tell  of  any  other  creature, 
the  hymn  goes  up  straight  like  a  flame  or  dart ; 


TWO  FRIENDS.  115 

it  is  Jacob's  ladder  into  heaven  without  either 
man  or  angel  ascending  or  descending  -the  shin 


ing  stairs." 


"  Have  you  seen,"  continued  Philip,  "a  book 
called  Ploughing  and  Sowing,  by  a  lady  deeply 
interested  in  the  improvement  of  the  boys  and 
young  men  employed  on  the  great  farms  in 
Yorkshire,  a  class  hitherto  neglected,  and  ex 
posed  to  the  peculiar  evils  which  arise  from 
close  association,  when,  as  under  the  Bothy  sys 
tem  in  Scotland,  the  humanizing  influences  of 
family  life  are  withdrawn.  She,  the  daughter  of 
a  clergyman,  speaks  of  Methodism  in  the  part 
of  England  she  lives  in  —  the  East  Riding  of 
Yorkshire  —  as  being  a  mitigated  form  of  dis 
sent,  involving  little  feeling  of  separation  from 
the  Church,  and  no  ill-will  towards  it.  She 
says  it  is  the  only  real  religion  of  the  working 
classes ;  to  be  '  brought  in '  and  '  to  join  a 
society '  is  with  them  synonymous  with  true 
earnestness  in  religion,  and  the  conversion  of 
the  soul  to  God.  When  you  are  told  that  such 
a  one  is  4  religious,'  you  always  find  on  inquiry 
that  it  means  he  has  joined  a  society ;  a  well- 


116  TWO  FRIENDS. 

conducted  person  who  has  not  done  so  will  be 
spoken  of  as  being  '  very  good  for  a  worldly- 
man.'  A  boy  said  to  the  writer,  '  All  the  folks 
at  our  farm  are  religious  except  me,  and  I  'm 
going  to  be  so  very  soon.'  The  boys,  influ 
enced  for  good  by  this  lady  —  herself  a  firm 
Churchwoman  —  seem,  with  little  more  than 
one  exception,  to  become  Wesleyans,  as  if  it 
had  been  the  natural  fruit  of  her  admonitions ; 
they  give  as  one  reason,  '  You  see,  what  with 
class-meetings,  and  prayer-meetings,  and  preach 
ings,  Wesleyans  have  so  much  more  means* 
than  Church  people.'  I  know  well  how  much 
is  involved  in  this  last  statement,  for  I  have 
so  often,  in  talking  to  devout  poor  people,  found 
that  it  was  the  need  of  a  closer  warmth  of  spir 
itual  sympathy,  and  this  need  only,  that  had 
drawn  them  from  the  Church  to  Methodism,  or 
some  other  form  of  dissent.  They  will  tell  you 
that  when  they  first  became  interested  in  spir 
itual  things,  anxious  inquirers  after  salvation, 
they  found  no  one  in  the  Church  to  whom 
they  could  open  their  hearts  ;  the  clergyman 

*  I.  e.  "  means  of  grace." 


TWO  FRIENDS.  117 

removed  from  familiar  intercourse,  fellow  Church 
people  of  their  own  class  indifferent  and. unen 
lightened." 

"  True,"  I  said,  "  but  how  much,  too,  of  the 
strength  of  Methodism  is  to  be  found  in  its 
directness.  As  Napoleon  in  his  grand  secret  of 
battle  would  accumulate  all  his  force  upon  one 
point  in  the  enemy's  ranks,  instead  of  diffusing 
it  from  line  to  line  in  a  series  of  desultory 
attacks,  so  does  this  teaching  press  home  upon 
the  soul  the  one  point  that  it  either  is  or  is  not 
turned  to  God,  and  urge  it,  if  still  reluctant  and 
wavering,  to  take  at  once  that  self-renunciating, 
self-dedicatory  step.  Surely  there  is  great,  ines 
timable  gain  in  thus  bringing  a  soul  into  a  felt 
relation  with  its  God,  in  making  the  first  step 
in  spiritual  progress  to  consist  in  a  real  con 
scious  transaction  between  the  soul  and  him ; 
and  yet  I  know  that  in  this  very  directness 
there  may  be  danger  ;  the  risk  of  recoil  that 
follows  upon  extreme  tension,  the  possibility  of 
mistaking  a  spasm  for  a  birth." 

"  These  are  dangers,"  returned  Philip,  "  in 
herent  in  every  system  that  makes  conversion 


118  TWO  FRIENDS. 

the  beginning  of  life  unto  God  ;  they  cease  to 
exist  when  this  great  fact  of  spiritual  experience 
is  received,  as  in  apostolical  teaching,  in  its  con 
nection  with  other  facts,  when  it  is  recognized  as 
growing  out  of  an  already  established  relation 
between  the  soul  and  God." 

"  You  would  then  preach  conversion,"  I  said, 
"  as  being  not  the  soul's  birth,  but  its  awakening  ; 
you  would  set  it  forth  as  the  turning-point  in 
the  direction  of  the  soul's  journey,  —  a  turning, 
be  it  ever  remembered,  not  always  needed,  for 
the  great  family  of  Christ  should  surely  number 
with  it  many  '  plants  grown  up  in  their  youth/ 
requiring  no  violent  transformation ;  and  yet 
to  the  great  mass  of  professing  Christians  a 
needed  change,  a  change  of  purpose  and  of 
affection  worked  by  the  Holy  Spirit  upon  the 
human  soul,  a  change  of  which  it  must  in  some 
degree  be  conscious." 

"  Yes,"  resumed  Philip,  "  as  surely  as  it 
would  be  conscious  of  any  earthly  love,  or  hope, 
or  joy.  '  He  that  believeth  hath  the  witness  in 
himself.'  And  here  we  touch  upon  another 
secret  of  the  strength  of  Methodism,  that  it 


TWO  FRIENDS.  119 

brings  the  great  and  comforting  reality  of  pardon 
and  acceptance,  the  love  and  peace  and  joy  of 
believing,  into  far  stronger  relief  than  is  usually 
done  in  Church  teaching.  When  we  consider 
the  state  of  our  lapsed  masses,  the  great  gulf 
their  modes  of  life  and  thought  have  fixed 
between  them  and  all  methods  of  regular  in 
struction  and  gradual  training,  we  learn  to  bless 
a  teaching  that  applies  such  powerful  stimulants, 
such  strong  consolations  to  the  soul ;  that  rouses 
it  from  the  deadly  lethargy  of  sense  and  sin, 
and  sends  it  out,  perhaps,  to  weep  in  solitary 
places,  to  4  wrestle,'  as  the  poor  Methodist  ex 
presses  it,  with  its  God  ;  that  lifts  it  from  the 
conflict  into  the  clear  sunshine  of  peace  and 
hope  and  rejoicing;  that  leaves  it  at  the  feet 
of  Jesus,  saying,  *  I  have  found  him  whom 
my  soul  loveth.'  Sudden  conversions,  with  the 
ecstatic  warmth  of  feeling  that  follows  upon 
them,  are  derided,  but  only  by  those  who  know, 
even  as  regards  natural  things,  little  of  the 
secret  powers,  the  reserved  forces  of  the  human 
spirit,  and  are  unaware  that  in  the  depths  of 
ignorant,  and  hardened,  and  weary,  and  dis- 


120  TWO  FRIENDS. 

traded  souls  there  is  still  a  Strength,  blind  and 
fettered  like  that  of  Samson,  needing  a  shock 
to  set  it  free.  4  The  kingdom  of  heaven  suffer- 
eth  violence,  and  the  violent  take  it  by  force.' 
Methodism  has  entered  into  the  heart  of  this 
saying." 

"  More  deeply,  you  think,  than  the  Church 
has  done  ?  " 

"  Far  more  deeply.  And  yet,"  continued 
Philip,  "  is  not  the  Church,  as  all-inclusive, 
able  to  provide  for  all  exceptional  as  well  as 
for  all  ordinary  wants  ?  Should  any  exigency, 
whether  spiritual  or  social,  whether  of  the  age 
or  of  the  individual  spirit,  find  her  unprepared 
to  meet  and  minister  unto  it  ?  In  the  whole 
ness  of  Catholicity  she  possesses  each  gift,  each 
doctrine  that,  taken  in  isolation,  makes,  as  it 
were,  the  peculiar  treasure  of  the  Separated 
Communions  ;  she  possesses  them,  but  in  how 
many  cases  as  treasure  hid!  her  best  things,  as 
in  careful  households,  being  too  often  kept  as 
things  of  state,  rather  than  used  as  things  of 
daily  service  and  delight.  What  does  she  need, 
however,  but,  even  like  the  scriptural  house- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  121 

holder,  to  bring  forth  out  of  her  treasure  things 
new  and  old ;  what  does  she  need  but  -to  take 
up  from  the  heart  her  ancient,  true  confession, 
*  I  believe  in  the  Holy  Ghost,  the  Lord  and 
Giver  of  life  '  ?  Has  this  third  Divine  Person 
been  as  yet  worshipped  and  glorified  among  us 
together  with  the  Father  and  the  Son  ?  And  yet 
where  shall  we  meet  with  a  more  implicit  avowal 
of  dependence  upon  its  Mighty  Agency  than  is 
to  be  found  in  our  liturgy  ?  Our  collects  have 
among  them  but  one  speech  and  language  ; 
and  this  is  the  confession  of  natural  weakness, 
joined  with  the  reliance  upon  supernatural  help. 
'  O  God,  forasmuch  as  without  thee  we  are  not 
able  to  please  thee  ;  mercifully  grant  that  thy 
Holy  Spirit  may  in  all  things  direct  and  rule 
our  hearts  through  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord.' 
When  I  consider  these  inspired  prayers,  and 
remember  how  long  they  have  been  the  life- 
breath  of  our  National  Church,  I  can  but  com 
pare  her  with  the  Bride  in  Canticles,  who  said, 
4 1  sleep,  but  my  heart  waketh.'  Her  Lord, 
however,  cometh  that  he  may  awake  her  out 
of  sleep.  We  have  long  had  Eldad  and  Medad 


122  TWO  FRIENDS. 

prophesying  in  the  camp,  fire  has  broken  out 
in  strange  remote  places,  and  all  that  we  see 
within  and  without  us  leads  us,  with  a  writer 
of  our  day,  to  claim  as  the  world's  chiefest 
blessing  a  revival  in  the  Catholic  Church.  Of 
this  revival  there  are  now  many  signs,  and  even 
if  we  still  miss  something  of  an  inward  spiritual 
glow,  the  baptism  of  the  Holy  Ghost  and  of  fire, 
the  very  statistics  of  our  Church  are  cheering. 
She  has  lighted  her  candle,  and  begun  to  sweep 
her  house  diligently ;  soon,  perhaps,  in  a  closer 
union  with  her  Head,  in  a  fuller  communion 
with  his  earthly  members,  she  may  call  in  her 
friends  and  neighbors  to  rejoice  with  her." 

Philip  was  silent ;  after  a  long  pause  I  said : 
"  Will  not  this  revival,  in  becoming  more  defi 
nite,  take  the  form  of  a  deepened  appreciation 
of  the  blessings  which  the  Church  has  held  per 
haps  in  a  loose  grasp,  held  out  with  a  cold  hand, 
but  always  held?  These  will  become  her  gifts, 
her  treasures,  rightly  divided,  lovingly  distrib 
uted  among  her  children,  who  will  become 
aware  of  their  true  value  through  rational  and 
spiritual  recognition.  I  place  these  two  words 


TWO  FRIENDS.  123 

together  advisedly,  for  it  is  the  irrational  which  is 
above  all  else  the  unspiritual;  we  shall  erer  find 
that  the  least  rational  view,  or  in  other  words 
the  most  superstitious  one,  of  any  divine  ordi 
nance,  is  invariably  the  one  which  least  helps  to 
spirituality.  As  the  mere  formalist,  who  values 
form  for  its  own  sake,  and  would  bind  it  where 
it  does  not  grow,  is  the  one  person  in  the  world 
who  the  least  appreciates  form's  deep  signifi 
cance  as  being  the  result  of  an  inner  law,  the 
expression  which  life  naturally  takes,  so  is  it  the 
person  who  looks  to  Baptism  or  to  the  Lord's 
Supper  to  save  him,  who  blindly  and  ignorantly 
accepts  the  rites  of  Christianity  as  an  end,  the 
one  who  least  of  all  enters  into  their  inapprecia 
ble  value  as  means." 

"  And  as  with  its  rites,"  said  Philip,  "  so  with 
its  great  institutions ;  it  is  those  who  understand 
what  a  Church  is,  who  are  the  least  likely  to 
rest  in  it,  or  in  anything  short  of  Him  to  whom 
it  leads.  And  even  so  with  the  Priesthood  ; 
I  sometimes  feel  as  if  this  Order,  coexistent 
with  Christianity  itself,  sometimes  unduly  ex 
alted,  sometimes  unduly  depressed,  had  yet  to 


124  TWO  FRIENDS. 

show  forth  its  true  beauty,  and  the  general 
Church  yet  to  learn  its  true  value.  How  inter 
esting  is  it  in  its  connection  with  national  and 
with  family  life ;  it  is  impossible,  even  where 
this  is  made  an  express  aim,  to  detach  these 
bonds,  — 

'  As  with  the  priest,  so  with  the  people ; 
As  with  the  people,  so  with  the  priest.' 

Their  standard  of  dignity,  their  level  of  purity, 
must  be  ever  one  ;  the  fire  of  the  altar  is  always 
brought  from  the  household  hearth,  the  hearth 
kindled  from  the  altar.  '  It  is  from  the  earth 
itself  that  the  salt  of  the  earth  is  taken.'  The 
name  of  priest  has  been  desecrated  till  the  very 
word,  in  some  degree,  carries  with  it  the  idea 
of  something  either  spiritually  despotic,  or  dryly 
ecclesiastical  and  official ;  yet  what  word,  what 
thought  is  in  reality  so  tender  as  that  of  a  Man, 
brought  nearer  than  other  men  are,  at  once  to  man 
and  to  God  ?  When  applied  to  our  Lord  him 
self,  no  other  of  his  offices  seems  to  bring  and 
to  keep  him  beside  us  in  so  intimate  and  human 
a  relation  as  that  of  his  *  unchangeable  Priest 
hood.'  *  He  is  a  Priest  forever  ' ;  one  separate 


TWO  FRIENDS.  125 

from  sinners  and  undefiled  ;  and  yet,  through 
this  very  separation,  drawn  into  the-,  closest 
union  with  Humanity.  Christ,  when  on  earth, 
was  upbraided  for  his  freedom  and  accessibility. 
4  Behold  this  man  receive th  sinners,  and  eateth 
with  them ' ;  and  yet,  like  Joseph,  the  very 
type  of  bounty  and  brotherhood,  he  is  one  '  that 
is  separated  from  his  brethren,'  drawing  their 
souls  after  him,  while  he  withdraws  from  their 
presence.  The  heart  desires  one  who  is  greater, 
purer,  kinder,  freer  than  itself,  one  standing 
aloof  from  its  conscious  falseness,  .its  self-con 
fessed  littleness  ;  therefore  is  Christ,  because  Tie 
is  lifted  up,  able  to  draw  all  men  unto  him ;  to 
draw  as  none  other  can  do,  close  to  Humanity, 
and  to  draw  it  close  to  him.  And  as  with  the 
Master,  so  with  his  true  disciples  ;  there  is 
ever  something  sacrificial  in  the  Christian's  life, 
something  which  will  ofttimes  compel  him  to 
4  put  a  space  '  between  his  own  soul  and  the 
souls  upon  which  his  desires  and  prayers  are 
set ;  he  must  free  himself  from  every  disturbing 
element,  and  be  content  to  depart  from  his 
brethren  in  many  things  and  at  many  seasons, 


126  TWO  FRIENDS. 

so  that  he  may  abide  with  them  forever  in  a 
truer,  deeper  fellowship  than  any  which  is 
founded  upon  the  conditions  of  an  earthly  amity. 
Unsecularity  is  the  strength  and  glory  of  the 
Christian  Priesthood ;  the  Agency  they  deal 
with  is  one  which,  like  that  of  some  great 
mechanic  force,  must  work  apart  from  that  on 
which  it  is  brought  to  bear,  — -  its  power  is  lost 
in  conformity,  it  lives  in  transformation,  in  re 
newal  ;  it  is  content  to  die  to  its  own  individual 
hopes  and  interests,  so  that,  falling  within  the 
wide  field  of  Humanity,  it  may  in  dying  bring 
forth  much  fruit. 


ET  a  little  while  longer,  and  Philip 
and  I  must  part ;  we  saw  before  us 
the  point  at  which  our  paths  would 
break,  never  perhaps  to  be  reunited,  for  the 
last  command  of  One  long  loved  and  followed, 
"  Go  teach  all  nations,"  had  ever  been  precious 
to  Philip's  spirit ;  he  was  now  about  to  obey 
its  leading,  and  to  go  forth  to  fields  of  labor  as 
yet  unbroken,  but  scarcely  more  arduous  than 
those  in  which  he  had  toiled  so  long.  "  Even 
unto  this  last "  had  been  the  motto  of  Philip's 
life  ;  he  had  chosen  his  portion  among  the 
things  that  all  others  reject,  and  in  now  devoting 
himself  to  the  most  wronged  and  most  benighted 
among  the  nations,  he  did  but  follow  out  the 
sure  and  secret  instinct  which  had  ever  drawn 
him  towards  the  forlorn,  the  degraded,  and  the 


128  TWO  FRIENDS. 

despised.  He  sailed  for  Africa  in  a  few  weeks. 
And  now  that  the  time  of  his  departure  drew 
nearer,  it  seemed  that  our  hearts  drew  closer, 
so  would  the  idea  of  that  solemn,  perhaps  life 
long  parting,  pervade  and  deepen  all  our  inter 
course,  and  cast  a  shadow  round  us,  —  a  shadow 
like  that  green  twilight  of  the  summer  woods, 
which  is  but  the  light  grown  tender. 

And  the  idea  of  that  utter  separation  brought 
with  it  a  strange  feeling  across  my  mind  ;  as 
if  Philip  were  already  severed  from  my  life  and 
all  familiar  things  belonging  to  it,  I  seemed  even 
now  to  view  him  apart  from  circumstance,  apart 
from  his  bodily  presence  ;  he  was  near  to  me, 
and  yet  afar,  like  one  who  has  been  long  dead. 
Even  while  we  talked  together,  my  mind  would 
sometimes  detach  itself  from  the  subject  we 
were  engaged  with,  to  occupy  itself  with  him, 
till  all  that  he  was  grew  up  before  me  in  clear 
and  defined  outline.  O  that  I  could  but  retain 
some  one  of  these  hasty  gestures,  some  one 
of  these  sudden,  unlooked-for  turns  of  thought 
in  which  the  deep  sincerity  of  his  nature  was 
revealed,  —  that  I  could  bring  it  back  to  me, 


TWO  FRIENDS.  129 

and  Philip  with  it,  in  days  that  were  yet  to 
come  !  Yet  it  was  doubtless  expedient,  for  me 
that  he  should  go  away,  for  man  doth  not  live 
by  bread  alone,  not  even  by  that  which  best 
nourishes  his  heart  and  spirit,  but  by  every 
word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of  God. 
And  that  word  was  now  Farewell.  We 
spent  much  of  our  remaining  time  together ; 
we  spoke  often  of  his  future  work,  and  even 
when  we  did  not  speak  or  consciously  think  of 
it,  the  idea  of  Africa  —  of  its  burning  sky  and 
sands,  its  strange  and  glowing  forms  of  life,  its 
vast  undeveloped  resources  —  of  all  that  makes 
it  a  land  of  wonder  and  mystery  —  was  so  far 
present  to  us  as  to  tinge  our  conversation  with 
something  of  an  unearthly,  ideal  character. 
How  clearly  I  can  recall  those  days,  which 
were  passed  by  the  sea-shore,  the  sea  which 
was  so  soon  to  part  us  ;  how  we  would  gaze 
upon  it  from  the  rocks,  or  still  looking  over  it, 
lie  for  hours  upon  the  grassy  cliffs,  and  yet 
keep  within  our  hearts  a  sense  of  the  rich  inland 
country  that  lay  behind  these  green,  desolate 
ridges,  thick  with  farms,  and  villages,  and  little 


130  TWO  FRIENDS. 

peaceful  towns.  Even  now,  through  a  thin 
belt  of  wood  in  the  distance,  I  could  see  the 
yellow,  sword-like  gleam  of  barley  flashing  in 
the  sunshine,  —  for  it  was  Autumn,  and  earth 
wore  upon  her  breast  the  rich  and  russet  gold 
that  is  more  goodly  than  all  she  hides  so  deep 
within  it.  The  very  air  was  still  and  fruit 
ful,  it  seemed  to  ripen  our  fancies  upon  it  along 
with  all  that  was  now  ripening,  our  words 
seemed  to  linger  on  it  lightly,  as  the  loosened 
leaves  will  linger  and  float  awhile  before  their 
quiet,  unmarked  fall.  Then  we  would  let  the 
broad  ocean  woo  our  thoughts  into  infinity; 
we  sent  them  across  it  fearlessly,  for  all  things 
seemed  to  beckon  us  onwards ;  the  line  of  silver 
that  spread  over  the  wide  glittering  bay,  the 
white  sea-birds  that  rose  and  fell  with  the 
waves,  —  even  the  dun  sails  of  the  fishing 
vessels,  touched  by  the  light  of  evening  with 
a  tawny  splendor,  seemed  also  to  be  winged 
messengers,  coming  to  us  we  knew  not  whence, 
and  taking  us  we  cared  not  whither. 

"  How  the  sea,"  I  remarked,  "  seems  to  round 
a  landscape,  to  finish  it,  and  yet  to  make  it  illim- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  131 

itable,  just  as  our  life  is  rounded  by  eternity. 
What  strength  and  gladness  too  is  there  in  its 
voice,  something  in  its  very  awfulness  which 
makes  it  facile  and  companionable.  Its  con 
tinual  movement  without  weariness,  its  flash, 
its  smile,  the  ever-changing  music  of  its  monot 
ony,  —  a  monotony  too  vast  to  be  oppressive,  — 
always  gives  me  a  feeling  intimately  connected 
with  that  of  our  future  life,  so  that  it  seems 
strange  to  me  to  read  in  Scripture  that  *  there 
shall  be  no  more  sea/  " 

"  It  is  hard,"  answered  Philip,  "  to  imagine 
that  there  will  be  anything  left  out  of  our 
future  life  which  is  beautiful  and  good  in  this 
one.  Once  I  was  easily  satisfied  with  the  idea 
of  heaven  ;  I  asked  for  nothing  more  than  to 
be  there;  now  I  have  grown  solicitous  about  the 
nature  of  our  happiness.  How  strange  it  is," 
he  continued,  "  that  there  should  be  in  some 
lives  this  order,  first  that  which  is  spiritual,  and 
then  that  which  is  natural.  Yet  so  it  has  been 
with  mine,  and  thus,  judging  from  what  has  at 
various  times  fallen  from  you,  with  your  own 
also.  I  feel  now  no  longer  able  to  contemplate 


132  TWO  FRIENDS. 

life  under  the  strict  and  absolute  aspect  under 
which  it  once  appeared  to  me,  as  being  a 
place  of  discipline,  a  training-ground  for  spirit 
ual  perfection,  a  way,  in  short,  to  a  higher  and 
more  complete  life.  Now  I  can  see  grandeur, 
beauty,  even  divinity,  in  things  tnat  do  not 
minister  to  any  of  these  objects,  —  that  even 
appear  to  lead  in  far  opposite  directions  ;  great 
ness,  even  Pagan  greatness,  irresistibly  attracts 
my  spirit,  and  at  times  I  feel  my  soul  drawn  out 
of  itself  with  a  love  that  is  almost  passion  for 
universal  truth  and  beauty,  '  those  things  which 
are  eternal  because  they  are.'  When  such 
moods  as  these  are  upon  me,  I  sometimes  won 
der  if  heaven  will  be  the  resurrection  of  our 
life,  of  our  whole  life,  if  it  will  be  the  bloom- 
time  and  expansion,  not  only  of  our  spiritual 
being,  but  of  all  those  germs  of  natural  delight 
which  seem  unable  to  unfold  here.  How  much 
is  there  in  life  to  which  life  is  itself  unfriendly ! 
How  much  that  must  fall  off,  wither,  perish ; 
how  many  first  loves  of  the  heart  and  soul  and 
spirit,  whose  destiny  is  written  in  their  beauty, 
they  are  fated  to  die  young.  Yet  how  fair  and 


TWO  FRIENDS.  133 

exalted  a  thing,  under  its  happier  conditions, 
is  natural  life  I  in  its  illusions,  which  .are  but 
truths  anticipated  in  the  clear  second-sight  of 
the  soul ;  in  its  elations,  when  the  heart  dilates 
and  lifts  up  the  whole  of  life  along  with  it ! 
I  discern  in  the  human  heart  an  innate  love  of 
splendor  and  distinction,  showing  itself  in  or 
dinary  life,  in  what  is  vulgar  and  ostentatious, 
yet  in  truth,  I  think,  connected  with  our  higher 
nature,  in  fact,  a  reminiscence  of  it,  such  as 
a  high-born  child,  stolen  from  his  home  in 
youth,  might  feel  awakening  within  him  at 
the  sight  of  grandeur. 

'  The  poorest  man 
Is  in  the  poorest  thing  superfluous ' ; 

human  nature  always  appears,  as  Shakespeare 
observes,  to  claim  something  beyond  what  it 
positively  needs ;  how  readily  will  it,  even  un 
der  its  most  depressed  conditions,  respond  to 
the  call  of  what  is  gay  and  festal ;  how  will 
ingly  will  it  let  its  hidden  poetry  bloom,  if  it 
be  but  for  half  a  day !  Our  very  Sunday- 
school  festivals  would  not  be  what  they  are 
to  us  but  for  the  bright  flags  and  banners 


134  TWO  FRIENDS. 

waving  above  our  little  procession,  our  music, 
our  triumphal  arches,  our  wreaths  and  pictures 
on  the  walls  of  the  school-room.  You  know," 
continued  Philip,  "  what  my  daily  life  is ;  how 
little  there  is  in  it  to  minister  to  the  instinct 
I  am  now  speaking  of;  yet  it  is  strange  how 
my  dreams  will  carry  me  among  scenes  of  more 
than  earthly  loveliness  ;  how  all  within  me, 
which  possibly  the  day  represses,  seems  to  cul 
minate  in  some  vision  of  enchantment.  Yet 
it  is  no  cold,  metallic  heaven  to  which  the 
gate  of  sleep  admits  me,  no  steely  splendor, 
no  glittering,  wearying  glory,  no  '  Jerusalem 
the  golden,'  as  so  many  of  our  hymns  describe 
it,  making  both  the  eyes  and  heart  ache ;  all 
that  I  find  there  is  tender,  human,  satisfying  ; 
its  very  light,  clothing  all  things  with  splen 
dor,  comes  warm  and  rose-flushed  through  the 
heart." 

Philip  paused,  and  resumed  abruptly :  "  I 
should  like  to  tell  you  one  of  these  dreams, 
though  to  do  so  will  be  like  drawing  out  one 
of  these  delicate  films  of  sea-weed  from  the 
pool,  where  it  is  spreading  in  such  beauty,  —  all 


TWO  FRIENDS.  135 

the  glow  and  lustre  will  fade  when  it  leaves 
the  water,  —  even  so  with  my  dream  .while  I 
try  to  put  it  into  words ; 

'  What  marks  hath  blessedness ; 
What  characters  whereby  it  may  be  told  ?  ' 

I  do  not  remember  the  beginning  of  my  dream, 
or  how  I  came  to  find  myself  in  a  smooth, 
grassy  opening  in  the  very  depths  of  a  forest ; 
the  thick  wood  stood  round  it  in  unbroken 
masses,  and  made  a  wall  of  verdure,  that  gave 
a  feeling  of  security  without  the  sense  of  gloom, 
so  wide  was  the  clearing,  so  broad  the  sunshine 
of  the  summer  noonday  that  seemed  to  concen 
trate  its  light  upon  it ;  yet  it  was  light  with 
out  glare,  a  calm,  steadfast  light,  like  that  of 
a  loving  eye,  too  friendly  to  confuse  or  dazzle. 
I  seemed  to  be  seated  at  a  table,  round  which 
men  of  noble,  even  princely  bearing  were  gath 
ered  in  deep  conference,  in  which  I  myself  was 
a  sharer,  with  One  of  middle  age  and  majestic 
aspect,  who  seemed  to  be  their  leader :  in  their 
dress  and  language  was  a  trace  of  something 
that  severed  them  from  our  present  times,  and 
yet  I  knew  not  to  what  age  of  the  world  to 


136  TWO  FRIENDS. 

refer  it.  At  a  little  distance  from  the  table 
a  boy  richly  dressed  sang  to  the  lute,  in  tones 
so  clear  and  ringing,  that  while  I  slept  both 
the  music  and  the  words  seemed  visible  to  me, 
such  ravishment  did  they  pour  within  my  soul. 
The  table  was  spread  for  a  banquet,  heaped 
with  costly  plate,  and  fruits,  and  wine;  all 
showed  splendor  and  profusion,  and  around 
it  was  boundless  hilarity,  chastened,  I  thought, 
but  not  checked  by  the  presence  of  some  lofty 
aim,  some  common  ground  of  hope  and  joy 
and  triumph,  that  shed  I  know  not  what  moral 
charm  over  the  whole  scene.  Each  brow  I 
looked  on  was  as  open  as  the  sunshine  that 
streamed  above  us ;  eye  met  eye,  and  heart 
answered  heart.  Then  the  scene  changed,  and 
I  was  wandering  amid  the  deep  glades  of  the 
forest,  in  the  warm  stillness  of  the  afternoon. 
As  I  strayed  onwards  I  met  scattered  parties 
of  children,  searching  for  flowers  and  berries  ; 
they  put  their  little  hands  within  mine,  they 
drew  me  down  beside  them  on  the  grassy  path 
to  tell  me  some  secret  all  important  to  their 
childish  hearts,  and  in  the  telling  they  put 


TWO  FRIENDS.  137 

their  arms  about  my  neck  and  kissed  me,  with 
the  kisses  of  the  soul,  closer  than  anything  can 
ever  come  on  earth.  A  little  farther  on  I  met 
bands  of  youths  and  maidens,  crowned  with 
flowers,  and  singing  as  they  descended  a  steep, 
rocky  path  that  led  into  the  deep  and  now  dark 
ening  ravines  of  the  forest.  They,  too,  greeted 
me  as  one  who  had  been  long  known,  yet  in 
their  greeting,  I  thought,  was  less  of  recog 
nition  than  of  affinity,  close  and  intimate  as 
had  been  the  kisses  of  the  children.  I  wan 
dered  with  them  towards  a  castle,  now  shining 
in  the  last  evening  glow.  O,  how  rich  was 
that  sunset,  purple  and  a  clear  amber,  that 
strove  long  for  the  mastery,  and  at  last  fused 
in  a  divided  victory.  It  had  grown  dusk  when 
I  reached  the  castle ;  my  bright  companions 
had  vanished,  but  I  heard  their  distant  voices ; 
and  still  far,  far  away,  that  of  the  singer  sing 
ing  to  his  lute.  Now,  methought,  I  walked 
in  the  sober  twilight  with  one  who  has  been 
ever  most  dear  to  me,  but  from  whom  the 
pressure  of  life  has  long  parted  me  ;  life  that 
can  sever  hearts  far  more  utterly  than  death. 


138  TWO  FRIENDS. 

We  paced  together  up  and  down  a  mossy 
terrace ;  we  spoke  of  many  things,  both  of 
trifling  and  of  serious  interest,  as  friends  do 
who  meet  after  the  separation  of  a  day.  I  did 
not  forget  the  circumstances  that  had  seemed 
to  estrange  us,  but  they  seemed  scarcely  worth 
alluding  to ;  we  were  now*  reunited,  all  was 
accounted  for,  all  was  natural  and  right.  I 
awoke  in  a  sort  of  rapture,  my  spirit  bathed 
in  a  conscious  fulness  of  rest  and  satisfaction 
such  as  not  even  my  dream  had  given ;  a  state 
described  by  the  prophet  when  he  says,  'After 
this,  I  awoke  and  beheld,  and  lo !  my  sleep 
was  sweet  unto  me.'  Slowly  I  awoke  out  of 
this  also  into  the  gray  November  morning  — " 

"  And  mourned,  I  suppose,  to  find  it  was 
but  a  dream  ?  " 

"  No,"  returned  Philip,  his  color  heighten 
ing  ;  "  you  will  wonder  when  I  tell  you  the 
thought  that  crept  over  me  with  that  blank, 
chill  dawn ;  bitterness  was  in  my  soul,  and 
along  with  it  a  sort  of  contempt  for  the  Life 
hereafter;  not  even  there,  I  thought,  shall  I 
behold  such  beings,  noble,  beautiful,  and  lov- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  139 

ing  as  these  that  sleep  has  brought  around 
me.  O,  how  dim  and  colorless,  how.  tame 
and  uniform,  did  the  Christian  heaven  at  that 
moment  seem !  " 

"  But  why,"  I  said,  "  should  heaven  seem 
so?" 

"  Why,  indeed,"  returned  Philip,  laughing ; 
"  I  only  say  that  it  did  seem  so." 

"  Perhaps,"  I  answered,  "  because  you  were 
thinking  of  it  as  it  appeared  to  the  ancient 
world.  The  blank,  shadowy  existence  before 
which  Achilles  and  Iphigenia  preferred  life, 
even  were  it  that  of  a  slave  '  toiling  among 
men  beneath  the  cheerful  light  of  the  sun,'  — 
the  Sheol,  of  which  Job  said,  '  I  shall  rest 
in  desolate  places,  among  kings  and  counsellors 
of  old.'  You  were  thinking,  as  they  did,  of 
the  second  life  of  the  soul  only,  —  a  thought 
that  lays  a  heavier  weight  upon  the  spirit  than 
even  that  of  annihilation.  How  much  has  the 
human  heart  gained  in  the  One  revelation, 
which  enables  it  to  say,  '  I  believe  in  the  res 
urrection  of  the  body ' ;  that  gives  the  flesh 
also  leave  '  to  rest  in  hope ' !  It  is  this  belief 


140  TWO  FRIENDS. 

which  brings  with  it  all  that  is  actual  and  per 
sonal  into  our  future  life  ;  all,  too,  that  is  home 
ly  and  familiar ;  that  gives  us  back  our  friends, 
looking  and  talking  as  they  did  here ;  gives 
us  back  our  feelings  and  occupations,  in  fact, 
our  lives.  For  the  body  is,  after  all,  the  home 
of  the  soul,  endeared,  even  like  the  actual 
home,  by  the  very  sorrows  that  have  been 
endured  within  it;  and  we  can  conceive  of 
nothing  entered  upon  in  separation  from  it 
that  is  worthy  to  be  called  life.  When  I  think 
of  death,  it  is  never  as  setting  the  soul  free 
from  the  body,  but  rather  as  admitting  it  into 
a  state  where  these  two,  in  the  marriage  of 
the  purified  soul  with  the  glorified  body,  will 
learn  the  true  blessedness  of  their  union,  all 
being  removed  that  has  sometimes  made  it 
irksome  and  constraining. 

"  And  thus  it  has  not  been  in  seasons  of 
weariness  and  despondency  that  the  thought 
of  death  has  been  the  sweetest  to  me;  but 
at  times,  when  my  whole  nature  has  been  the 
most  keenly  strung  to  enjoyment,  there  has 
come  within  my  soul  a  longing,  an  aching  wish 


TWO  FRIENDS.  141 

to  be  more  in  the  heart  of  the  beauty  which 
encompasses  but  does  not  touch  it;  a  desire 
'  not  to  be  unclothed,  but  clothed  upon,  that  mor 
tality  may  be  swallowed  up  in  life.'  Do  you 
know  anything  of  that  feeling  of  sadness  and 
disquietude  peculiar  to  the  depth  of  summer ; 
something  which  will  not  let  the  heart  rest 
in  the  midst  of  the  fulness  and  stillness  that 
surrounds  it,  but  weighs  it  down  with  a  sense 
of  strain  and  oppression,  as  if  it  were  hard 
for  it  to  respond  to  the  full  and  joyful  note 
which  nature  then  strikes  ?  It  is  not  only  the 
renewed  spirit  that  reaches  out  after  something 
far  better  than  is  here  to  be  attained ;  there 
is  a  fulness  of  natural  as  well  as  of  spiritual 
joy  not  yet  wholly  given.  We  have  nothing 
to  draw  with,  yet  the  well  is  deep,  and  man's 
heart  and  his  flesh  cry  out  for  the  living  God : 
they  claim  the  resurrection  you  speak  of;  they 
ask  to  see  life,  the  whole  of  life  bloom,  as  a 
flower,  according  to  the  fancy  of  the  old  al 
chemists,  might  be  revived  from  its  ashes. 

"  And  is  it  not  some  instinct  of  this  resur 
rection   that   lends  such  an   intimate  charm  to 


142  TWO  FRIENDS. 

all  that  gives  oneness  to  life  ?  There  is  noth 
ing  in  our  nature  more  religious  than  that 
which  binds  life  consciously  together,  the  power 
of  Association ;  the  full  strength  and  sweetness 
of  its  deep  conservatism  can  be  only  known, 
I  think,  to  pure  lives,  whose  very  ghosts  are 
comfortable,  to  loving  spirits  that  have  been 
faithful  to  the  treasure  committed  to  them,  even 
if  it  be  but  to  the  '  few  things '  of  their  earli 
est  days.  Also,  I  think  its  power  is  best  felt 
in  lives  that  have  been  so  far  happy  that  they 
have  known  no  violent  wrench  or  dislocation, 
no  blight,  leaving  some  wide  space  unfruitful 
for  the  after  harvest,  so  that  the  wealthy  soul, 
'  enriched  unto  bountifulness,'  may  bring  forth 
out  of  its  treasure  things  new  and  old.  Life 
is  one;  therefore  it  is  well  that  childhood  and 
youth  should  be  happy ;  every  life  should  be 
gin  in  Eden ;  should  have  its  blest  traditions 
to  return  to,  its  holy  places  on  which  an  eter 
nal  consecration  rests.  The  dew  of  the  birth 
of  each  most  hallowed,  most  human  thought 
and  impulse  within  us  is  of  the  womb  of  the 
morning,  and  there  is  surely  a  literal  meaning 


Tiro  FRIEXDS.  1  ;  ; 

in  our  Saviour's  words,  *  Unless  ye  become  like 
little  children,  ye  cannot  enter  the>  kingdom 
of  heaven.*  The  moments  that  set  its  doors 
widest  open  show  us  this;  at  times,  when  the 
great  unseen  world  is  nearest  to  us,  the  thought 
of  childhood  will  return,  and  at  the  sound  of 
the  everlasting  ocean,  we  stoop  down  to  pick 
up  the  shells  we  used  then  to  play  with.  When 
a  great  happiness  floods  our  life,  and  lifts  it 
for  above  its  accustomed  level,  it  sets  it  down 
upon  no  peak  or  summit  of  ecstasy,  but  brings 
us  upon  its  wave  some  childish,  trivial  joy, 
some  fondly  recollected  pleasure;  it  fills  the 
heart  with  the  sunshine  of  some  long,  golden 
afternoon  of  holiday,  or  with  the  fireside  warmth 
of  some  long-deserted  parlor.  Do  you  re 
member  how  Joan  of  Arc,  when  crowned  at 
Rheims,  sees  the  kind,  homely  faces  of  her 
sisters  in  the  crowd,  and  is  at  once  carried 
back  to  the  green  valley,  the  silent  mountain, 
the  free  simplicity  of  her  early  days?  All 
that  she  has  attained  since  then  seems  dream 
and  shadow.  *  The  evening  and  the  morn 
ing  make  our  day.*" 


144  TWO  FRIENDS. 

"  The  homeliest  associations,"  said  Philip, 
"  are  ever  those  that  have  in  them  the  most 
of  tenderness.  No  passage  in  Holy  Scripture 
has  ever  seemed  to  me  more  affecting  than 
those  words  used  by  the  Evangelist  in  de 
scribing  our  Saviour's  garments  at  the  Trans 
figuration  :  «  Whiter  than  any  fuller  on  earth  can 
whiten.'  The  simplicity  of  the  allusion  seems 
to  bring  that  majestic,  unearthly  scene,  with 
all  its  overwhelming  associations,  into  unity 
with  our  daily  life ;  it  knits  and  weaves  to 
gether  the  every-day  and  the  everlasting,  and 
bids  us 

'Live 
In  reconcilement  with  our  stinted  powers, 

and  seek 

For  present  good  in  life's  familiar  face, 
And  build  thereon  our  hopes  of  good  to  come.' 

"  How  often  have  I  felt  a  sacred  power  in 
the  common  things  of  life !  They  set  a  limit 
to  thoughts  that  are  too  vast  and  oppressive 
for  our  mortal  nature,  and  tend,  in  some  way 
which  I  cannot  analyze,  to  connect  our  per 
sonal  identity  with  the  eternal  existence  of 
God.  I  have  known  moments  when  they 


TWO  FRIENDS.  145 

have  become  sacramental  to  me ;  when  they 
have  seemed  to  bring  God  before  ma  as  a 
tender  parent,  whose  mercies  are  over  all  his 
works.  How  often  is  he  made  known  to  us 
in  the  breaking  of  bread ;  revealed  through 
some  slight  circumstance  ;  made  manifest  un 
der  some  familiar  aspect !  I  remember,  last 
year,  when  I  was  recovering  from  a  fever, 
lying  one  evening  between  sleeping  and  wak 
ing,  too  weak  and  restless  to  command  my 
thoughts,  which  drifted  out  far  beyond  every 
known  boundary  into  that  dark,  confused,  dif 
fused  idea  of  God,  in  which  he  is  at  once 
everywhere  and  nowhere.  Gently,  gradually, 
I  was  drawn  back  by  the  low  tones  of  my 
mother  and  sister  pleasantly  talking  over  some 
little  household  incidents  in  the  fire-light ;  their 
gentle,  subdued  voices  seemed  to  change  the 
world  from  the  void  and  chaos  of  nature  into 
my  Father's  house ;  they  led  my  spirit  into 
His  Presence  who  rejoices  in  the  habitable 
parts  of  the  earth,  and  makes  his  delight  in 
the  sons  of  men. 

"  And  how  friendly,"  he  continued,  "  to  our 

7  j 


146  TWO  FRIENDS. 

higher  nature  are  all  things  that  are  simple, 
kindly,  homely,  as  opposed  to  such  as  are  fac 
titious  and  conventional.  Artificial  tastes  and 
pleasures  can  never  either  cheer  or  refresh  the 
heart ;  they  have  no  root  within  our  true  life ; 
they  are  not  of  the  Father,  but  of  the  world.! 
How  sweet  and  wholesome  are  the  pleasures 
that  go  into  small  room  ;  the  humble,  simple, 
accustomed  sights  and  sounds  that  bring  the 
soul  at  once  into  the  open  air.  Some  of 
these  are  at  all  times  full  of  deep  suggestions, 
of  quiet,  unspoken  recognitions,  filling  the  heart 
with  unspeakable  tranquillity  and  peace.  All 
that  has  to  do  with  rural  occupations,  —  hay 
making  and  harvesting,  the  cheerful  bustle  and 
cackle  of  a  farm-yard,  the  breath  of  cows,  the 
broad,  slanting  light  of  evening,  the  wide  glit 
ter  of  a  meadow  in  an  autumn  morning,  and 
neither  last  nor  least,  the  aspect  of  a  cottage 
kitchen  in  the  afternoon,  with  'all  things  in 
order  stored,'  —  these  things  fill  me  with  a  sense 
of  the  Fatherhood  of  God  —  " 

"  Such,"  I  said,  "  as  you   would  gain  from 
some   passage   in   the   New  Testament,   where 


TWO  FRIENDS.  147 

Christ  makes  himself  a  partaker  of  flesh  and 
blood,  through  his  gracious  condescension  to  the 
humble  requirements,  the  lowly  solaces  our  na 
ture  claims ;  as  when  at  the  wedding-feast  he 
turns  the  water  into  wine,  and  stoops  down  at 
the  last  supper  to  wash  the  feet  of  his  disciples." 
"  And  yet,"  returned  Philip,  musingly,  "  is 
Christ  indeed  a  friend  to  the  region  we  have 
been  speaking  of,  —  a  friend,  I  mean,  who  shows 
himself  friendly  ?  Sometimes  it  seems  to  me  as 
if  he  would  at  the  last  be  generous  to  all  that 
is  in  itself  excellent ;  that  he  will  yet  stoop 
down  and  recognize  some  of  the  fair  and  fading 
flowers  of  humanity  that  he  now  passes  by 
without  a  glance  ;  that  he  will  breathe  upon 
them  and  bid  them  be  ever-blooming.  Yet  the 
silence  of  the  New  Testament  is  a  wonderful 
thing.  Love,  except  of  a  spiritual  kind,  is 
never  mentioned  there.  Outward  nature,  of 
which  the  Old  Testament  is  so  full,  scarcely 
brought  in,  even  as  the  background  of  the 
scene  filled  up  with  man's  deeper  and  immor 
tal  destinies.  Where  in  these  pages  is  the 
world,  —  the  world  that  goes  on  around  us, 


148  TWO  FRIENDS. 

and  we  along  with  it ;  the  world  of  feeling,  of 
endeavor,  of  hope,  of  wearying  care  and  bitter 
anguish ;  '  this  world,  troublesome  and  yet  be 
loved,'  that  we  do  not,  cannot  escape  from  until 
•we  have  done  with  it  forever  ?  And  when  I 
think  upon  these  things,"  he  added,  "  an  oblique 
light  seems  cast  upon  what  has  long  seemed 
strangely  certain  to  me,  that  Christianity  should 
tend  not  only,  as  you  say,  to  separation,  but 
also  to  narrowness.  It  is  easy  to  be  wise  upon 
the  mistakes  of  religious  people,  to  say  that 
they  miss  the  broad  and  loving  character  of  the 
Gospel,  straitening  it  to  their  own  minds  ;  but 
it  is  not  so  easy  to  account  for  some  constantly 
reappearing  signs  of  a  limited  mode  of  viewing 
nature  and  life,  such  as  over-strictness  in  the 
education  of  the  young,  and  a  strained  disap 
proval  of  amusement,  so  evidently  a  part  of 
man,  that  it  may,  under  its  more  favorable 
conditions,  be  literally  termed  his  re-creation. 
Nor  is  it  yet  easy  to  account  for  what  it  would 
be  vain  to  deny,  that,  looking  at  things  on  a 
broader  scale,  the  spiritual  basis  has  ever  proved 
too  weak  to  bear  up  the  whole  man.  How 


TWO  FRIENDS.  149 

narrow,  how  little  human,  has  been  in  all  ages 
the  merely  religious  world !  And  how~  largely 
has  that  very  world  benefited  by  movements 
exterior,  and  even  antagonistic  to  it ;  as  when 
the  revival  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  literature 
brought  a  fresh  breath  over  Christendom. 
Mere  spirituality  seems  to  exhaust  the  soil  that 
rears  it,  so  that  Christianity  must  always  gain 
much  from  extraneous  sources.  It  does  so,  in 
our  own  day,  from  science  and  general  social 
progress.  These  are  its  friends,  though  some 
times  disguised  ones;  and  Christ  still  gathers 
where  he  did  not  straw,  and  reaps  where  he 
did  not  sow." 

"  But  are  you  so  sure,"  I  said,  "  that  Christ 
has  not  strawed  and  sown  in  these  very  fields  ? 
Christ  is  the  light  of  the  world  as  well  as  the 
light  of  his  Church.  He  is  a  Man,  One  to 
whom  nothing  that  Humanity  endures  or 
achieves  can  be  alien,  so  that  it  seems  less 
strange  to  me  that  some  of  the  greatest  con 
quests  of  the  truth  should  have  been  won  for 
the  Church  and  not  by  it,  —  that  so  many  rich 
acquisitions,  take,  for  instance,  that  of  religious 


150  TWO  FRIENDS. 

toleration,  should  have  fallen  into  it  through 
the  gradual  progress  of  human  enlightenment. 
The  Church  and  the  world  must  grow  to 
gether, —  they  do  grow  together,  though  they 
cannot  as  yet  grow  in  harmony ;  suffering 
from  the  world's  enmity,  suffering  still  more 
from  its  friendship,  straitened  on  all  sides,  the 
Church  has  become  straitened  in  herself,  timid 
and  distrustful,  as  that  which  is  in  antagonism 
must  ever  be.  In  all  that  concerns  Christianity 
under  its  present  dispensation,  we  must  be  pre 
pared  to  meet  with  a  certain  degree  of  check 
and  disappointment.  We  find  it  even  in  Christ 
himself ;  he  will  now  be  loved  for  his  own  sake, 
be  followed  in  his  silence  and  severity ;  he  will 
still  give  a  present  contradiction  to  many  of 
the  heart's  most  fair  and  cherished  ideals,  just 
as  his  earthly  coming  in  poverty  and  humilia 
tion  contradicted  the  Jewish  idea  of  the  Mes 
sianic  world-dominion,  yet  this  was  a  true  idea, 
and  one  which  Christ  will  yet  abundantly  fulfil. 
And  if  the  Christ  of  the  New  Testament  does 
not,  as  you  say,  meet  and  satisfy  all  the  demands 
of  our  nature,  —  if  it  does  not  answer  to  the 


TWO  FRIENDS.  151 

whole  man,  is  it  not  because  it  does  not  give 
us  the  whole  Christ  ?  Where  in  the  four  Gos 
pels  shall  we  find  the  Messiah,  full  of  glory, 
majesty,  and  terror,  red  in  his  apparel,  travel 
ling  in  the  greatness  of  his  strength,  the  King 
of  righteousness  and  peace,  the  Lord  and  Giver 
of  earthly  fulness  and  felicity,  binding  his  foal 
to  the  vine  and  his  ass's  colt  to  the  choice  vine  ? 
Are  we  not  slow  to  receive  all  that  the  Psalms 
and  the  prophets  have  spoken  concerning  HIM  ? 
Wolff,  if  you  remember,  says  that  the  error  of 
the  Jews  of  old  did  not  lie,  as  we  often  deem, 
in  looking  to  Christ  as  the  founder  of  a  tem 
poral  kingdom,  but  in  failing  to  recognize  him 
under  the  humiliation  which  was  foretold  as  to 
precede  its  establishment.  For  this  want  of 
recognition  our  Lord  himself  rebukes  his  disci 
ples,  when  he  says  to  them,  '  Ought  not  Christ 
to  have  suffered  these  things,  and  then  to  have 
entered  into  his  glory  ?  '  And  as  regards 
present  times,  Wolff  tells  us  that  he  was  never 
able  to  make  any  way  in  argument  with  his 
own  people  until  he  freely  admitted  to  them  that 
the  Messiah  had  yet  to  come.  '  At  what  time,' 


152  TWO  FRIENDS. 

they  would  ask,  '  has  the  Christian  Church  seen 
the  fulfilment  of  prophecies  such  as  those  of 
the  llth  of  Isaiah  and  the  72d  Psalm  ?  '  " 

"  True,"  said  Philip,  "  there  is  nothing  his 
torical  in  these  passages  of  Scripture,  nor  yet 
in  that  remarkable  series  of  Psalms,  beginning 
at  the  95th,  which  have  been,  with  the  100th, 
in  which  they  culminate,  considered  as  form 
ing  one  grand  prophetic  poem,  celebrating  the 
majesty  and  righteousness  of  Christ's  kingdom 
on  earth.  Their  cry  is  still,  4  He  cometh,  he 
eometh  to  judge  the  world  in  righteousness,  and 
the  people  with  his  truth.' '' 

"  And  with  Christ's  second  coming,"  I  said, 
"  as  the  Restorer  of  all  things,  is  evidently 
linked  the  conversion  and  restitution  of  the 
Jewish  people  ;  '  when  the  Lord  shall  build  up 
Zion,  he  shall  appear  in  his  glory.'  This  con 
nection  is  brought  out  so  clearly  in  the  Old 
Testament,  that  it  seems  strange  that  Christians 
can  continually  read  it,  and  still  persist  in  tak 
ing  the  magnificent  promises,  of  which  Isaiah, 
Zechariah,  and  all  the  lesser  prophets  are  so 
full,  in  their  spiritual  regenerative  aspect 


TWO  FRIENDS.  153 

when  their  plain  literal  meaning  is  one  which 
does  not  drop  off  like  a  husk  at  the.  unfolding 
of  their  spiritual  import,  but  expands  along 
with  it,  growing  like  a  double  fruit  upon  the 
same  stalk,  so  that  neither  can  ripen  fully  until 
both  do.  Christ  is  to  be  a  Light  to  lighten  the 
Gentiles,  and  to  be  the  glory  of  his  people 
Israel ;  the  same  Hour  (so  speaks  prophetic 
testimony)  that  brings  in  Israel's  conversion, 
will  bring  in  man's  full  reconciliation  with  God. 
The  veil  which  overspreads  all  nations  rests  as 
yet  upon  the  eyes  of  Israel,  and  upon  the  heart 
of  the  Gentile  Church,  'yet  in  this  mountain, 
in  Zion,'  saith  God,  4  it  shall  be  taken  away '  ; 
a  promise  initially  fulfilled  in  the  day  of  Pente 
cost,  but  to  receive  a  yet  fuller  accomplishment 
in  the  Day  when  God  returns  to  Jerusalem 
with  mercies.  That  day  will  be  one  of  rich 
ingathering.  4  Great,'  saith  the  Prophet  Hosea, 
4  shall  be  the  day  of  Jezreel '  ;  Jezreel,  a  name 
combining  terror  with  mercy,  meaning  at  once 
4 1  will  scatter '  and  4 1  will  sow.'  God  will 
sow  by  them  whom  he  has  scattered  ;  and  it  is 
certain  that  the  Jews  will  be  in  an  eminent 
7* 


154  TWO  FRIENDS. 

degree  the  Evangelists  of  the  Second  Dispensa 
tion,  as  they  were  of  the  First." 

"  It  is  an  office,"  said  Philip,  "  for  which 
they  will  be  in  many  ways  peculiarly  fitted. 
Called  into  the  vineyard  at  the  Eleventh  Hour, 
they  have  not,  like  the  Christian  Church,  borne 
the  long  day's  heat  and  burden ;  nor  will 
they  have,  like  it,  a  time-engendered  acrimony, 
caused  by  the  sharp  separation  of  opinion,  to 
contend  with.  Do  you  remember  the  passage 
in  Wolff's  Autobiography,  where  he  tells  us  of 
his  going  up  Mount  Sinai  to  pray  for  the  whole 
Church  of  God  ;  for  the  noble  Stolberg  and  the 
other  Roman  Catholic  friends  of  his  early  life, 
endeared  through  so  many  kindly  associations ; 
for  Mr.  Drummond  and  all  his  beloved  Eng 
lish  friends  and  fellow-helpers  in  the  work  of 
Christ ;  and  for  his  own  people,  those  kinsfolk, 
'  to  whom  pertaineth  the  promises,  whose  are  the 
fathers,  and  of  whom  concerning  the  flesh 
Christ  came '  ?  God  hath  not  cast  away  his 
people  whom  he  foreknew  ;  their  faith,  when 
it  is  once  enlightened  to  receive  Christ,  will 
have  a  character  of  its  own ;  it  will  be  child- 


TWO  FRIENDS.  155 

like,  implicit,  and  objective.  It  must  be  easy, 
I  think,  and  natural  for  a  Jew  to  look-  to  God 
as  a  father;  all  their  ancient  ideas  of  him, 
whether  of  severity  or  love,  are  fatherly;  he 
is  even  '  the  Father  of  the  dew '  :  one  who 
takes  all  creation  under  his  individual  superin 
tendence.  So  that  to  them,  in  a  peculiar  man 
ner,  belong  the  fruition  of  all  those  rich  earthly 
and  yet  evangelic  promises,  into  which  the 
Christian  Church,  baptized  into  the  death  of 
her  beloved  Lord,  and  cradled  in  suffering  and 
strife,  has  as  yet  scarcely  entered.  It  must 
wait  for  the  companionship  of  the  reconciled 
Elder  Brother,  then  there  will  be  dancing  and 
music ;  '  music  in  the  heart,  music  in  the 
house,'  —  in  the  whole  great  united  house 
hold." 

"  The  Messianic  promises,"  I  said,  "  are  in 
deed  earthly ;  they  are  of  the  earth,  as  the  rose 
and  the  lily  are,  and  yet  not  '  earthy ' ;  there  is 
no  grave-damp  about  them,  no  odor  of  corrupti 
bility.  What  picture  can  be  conceived  by  the 
human  imagination  more  lovely  than  that  scene 
portrayed  in  the  eighth  chapter  of  Zechariah, 


156  TWO  FRIENDS. 

where  all  the  finer  affections  of  our  nature  find 
room  and  time  for  expansion,  where  the  heart 
enjoys  its  long-desolated  Sabbaths !  Here,  the 
ground  gives  her  increase,  and  the  heavens 
their  dew ;  4  in  the  streets  of  Jerusalem  old  men 
and  old  women  dwell,  and  every  man  with  his 
staff  in  his  hand  for  very  age ' ;  while  the  same 
streets  are  4  full  of  boys  and  girls  playing ' ;  and 
the  still  remembered  fasts  of  the  Old  Covenant 
are  4  turned  into  joy  and  gladness,  and  cheerful 
feasts.'  And  we  must  not  fail  to  remark,  that 
this  period  of  unexampled  temporal  felicity  is 
also  one  of  extraordinary  *  spiritual  illumination, 
a  time  of  prayer,  of  intercession,  of  holy  activity; 
a  time  when  God  dwells  in  the  midst  of  his 
people ;  a  time  of  intimate  correspondence  be 
tween  earth  and  heaven.  When  God  says  in 
Hosea,  '  I  will  hear  the  heavens,  and  they  shall 
hear  the  earth,'  he  says  also,  'And  the  earth 
shall  hear  the  corn,  and  the  wine,  and  the  oiV  It 
is  easy  to  decry  the  literal  interpretation  of 
prophecy  as  carnal  and  limited;  easy  to  ask, 
what  better  shall  we  be  for  hills  of  corn  and 

*  Zechariah  viii.  19,  seq. 


TWO  FRIENDS.  157 

barley,  and  for  mountains  dropping  sweet  wine  ? 
but  who  can  look  into  the  world  as,it*nowis, 
without  admitting  how  true,  how  heaven-sent  a 
blessing  material  abundance  would  be,  were 
that  within  man  which  is  inimical  to  its  true 
enjoyment  once  taken  away  ?  It  is  only  human 
selfishness  that  makes  good  things  evil  to  us ; 
the  richest  boon  the  Father  can  send  carries  no 
sorrow  with  it  to  hearts  that  are  prepared  to 
share  it  as  brethren.  Even  as  we  live  and  feel 
now,  '  comfort,'  which  is  too  often  a  selfish  and 
hardening  thing,  may  become  an  evangelic  one. 
The  spirit  of  the  world  is  one  which  makes  a 
great  feast,  and  invites  many  to  it,  but  gives  no 
kiss  to  the  individual  guest,  —  does  not  anoint 
his  head  with  oil,  brings  him  no  water  for  his 
feet;  but  do  you  not  know  houses  where  a 
refined  attention  to  bodily  comfort  seems  but 
the  expression  of  an  inward  cordiality,  —  houses 
where  a  sort  of  physical  bien-etre  prevails,  where 
a  genial  soul  makes  its  presence  felt  like  that  of 
the  summer  sunshine,  or  the  winter  hearth,  so 
that  your  very  food  seems  to  do  you  more  good 
than  it  does  elsewhere?  In  the  late  accounts 


158  TWO  FRIENDS. 

of  the  work  of  the  Bible-women  in  London,  the 
poor  women  who  are  sometimes  invited  to  pass 
an  evening  at  the  Mission-room  seem  to  derive 
as  much  benefit  from  the  kind  looks  and  gentle 
voices  of  the  ladies,  from  the  good  tea,  the  good 
fire,  the  flowers  set  upon  the  table,  the  unaccus 
tomed  luxury  of  a  quiet  room,  as  from  anything 
they  gain  in  the  way  of  direct  instruction.  In 
all  these  things  there  is  a  tenderness  that  goes 
to  the  very  soul." 

fc*  Yes,"  said  Philip,  "  and  that  does  not  de 
part  from  it  quickly.  There  are  some  whom  I 
have  known  on  earth,  who  are  now  departed 
from  it,  that  I  find  it  difficult  to  think  of,  even 
in  heaven,  under  any  other  aspect  than  that 
of  ministering,  welcoming,  making  every  one 
around  them  comfortable,  though  I  know  not 
what  form  their  tender,  ever  active  solicitude 
may  take  where  there  are  none  weary,  or  sick, 
or  sorrowful,  where  there  are  no  strangers  to  be 
entertained,  no  wayfarers  to  be  cheered  and 
comforted." 

Philip  was  silent;  at  this  moment  a  sudden 
smile  came  out  over  the  sky  and  sea,  that 


TWO  FRIENDS.  159 

seemed  like  an  answer  to  our  unspoken  thoughts. 
O,  what  did  it  not  recall ;  what  v  did  it  not 
promise !  The  glory  of  the  terrestrial  and  of 
the  celestial  in  one !  Memory  and  Hope,  that 
met  and  kissed  each  other  in  the  thought  of 
partings  that  had  been  rich  in  a  heavenly  fore 
taste,  in  the  anticipation  of  meetings  that  would 
be  more  tender  than  even  the  partings  of  earth ! 

"  There  was  no  cloud,  no  flaming  bar,  no  line 
Of  fire  along  the  west,  but  solemnly 
Heaven  glowed  unto  its  depths,  as  if  the  curso 
Were  lifted  upwards  from  our  universe 
One  moment's  Sabbath  space,  and  only  love 
Stooped  down  above  its  world !  —  so  from  above 
A  smile  dropt  visibly  on  earth,  that  prest 
To  meet  that  sign  of  reconcilement,  blest 
On  brow  and  bosom,  blest." 

Philip  was  the  first  to  speak.  "  How  Na 
ture  can  sometimes  hide  her  deep,  original 
wound  !  Where,  at  such  a  moment  as  this, 
is  the  faint  undergroaning  of  creation  ?  " 

"  Yet  surely,"  I  said,  "it  is  in  such  moments 
as  these  that  the  heart  puts  in  its  strongest 
claim  for  the  promised  restitution  of  all  things. 
When  Nature  hides  her  wound,  she  does  but 


160  TWO  FRIENDS. 

hide  it,  and  of  this  the  soul  is  conscious.  When 
her  smile  is  the  kindest,  the  heart  feels  that 
she  can  hut  smile ;  she  has  no  healing  halm 
to  pour,  no  life-giving  Word  to  speak.  She 
has,  it  is  true,  a  ministry  for  man,  hut  in  it 
there  is  nothing  priestly,  no  laver  of  regener 
ating  purity,  no  chrism  of  absolving  love.  Her 
house  is  the  house  of  bondage,  out  of  which 
she  can  never  lead  man's  spirit,  for  Nature 
herself  needs  to  be  redeemed.  Science  has  taught 
us  that  discord  was  not  introduced  into  crea 
tion  by  man,  nor  did  it  follow,  as  it  is  usual 
to  suppose,  in  consequence  of  his  disobedience  ; 
the  revelations  of  geology  prove  abundantly 
that  pain  and  death  reigned  from  the  begin 
ning,  therefore  is  it  that  the  Cross  must  go  so 
deep.  Christ  must  subdue  this  kingdom  also, 
must  deliver  it  up  to  God,*  even  to  the  Father, 
and  until  then  Christ's  own  kingdom  remains 
a  kingdom  of  patience  and  of  subjection.  His 
word,  one  of  separation,  sharper  than  that  of 
any  two-edged  sword,  and  the  Christian  life, 
one  in  which  there  is  ever  a  foreseen  death, 

«  1  Cor.  xv.  24. 


TWO  FRIENDS.  161 

the  sacrifice  of  the  human  will,  '  even  the  death 
of  the  cross.'  " 

"  And  are  you,"  said  Philip,  "  led  to  believe 
that  this  separation  will  go  on  through  the 
whole  of  the  present  dispensation,  becoming 
ever  more  and  more  definite  ?  The  final  vic 
tory  of  good  is  the  one  great  certainty  of  the 
believing  heart ;  and  our  natural  feelings  lead 
us  to  expect  that  this  victory  will  be  gradual 
and  progressive  ;  an  expectation,  however, 
which  is  not  confirmed  by  prophecy,  which 
leads  us  rather  to  contemplate  the  two  king 
doms  of  good  and  evil,  each  increasing, 
strengthening  themselves  against  each  other 
before  a  great  concluding  struggle,  out  of 
which  good  will  rise  triumphant  and  jubilant  ? 
A  friend  has  asked  me,  l  Will  not  good  and 
evil,  before  this  final  shock,  draw  more  widely 
apart,  and  become  compact?  Good,  through 
the  building  up  of  Christ's  body,  and  the  closer 
mutual  adhesion  of  his  scattered  members ; 
Evil,  also  standing  up  incarnate  in  the  person 
of  Antichrist  ?  '  " 

"  There  is  surely,"  I  said,  "  something  of 


162  TWO  FRIENDS. 

this  gradual  separation  revealed  in  the  deep 
ened  moral  consciousness  of  the  days  we  live 
in.  Our  eyes  seem  opened  to  discern  between 
good  and  evil ;  those  who  now  prefer  the  lat 
ter,  do  so  knowingly  and  consciously.  We  can 
hardly,  as  even  worthy  people  were  wont  to  be 
in  the  generation  which  is  passing  from  us,  be 
amused  with  books  and  representations  which 
draw  their  zest  from  the  exhibition  of  sin  and 
folly.  We  feel  that  there  is  in  these  things 
the  nature  and  the  power  of  death ;  and  the 
spirit  of  levity,  even  though  it  occupy  a  large 
space  in  our  literature,  seems  foreign  to  it,  and 
not  to  belong  to  our  present  order.  Even  the 
intellect  of  our  day  revolts  from  the  shallow 
systems  that  are  now  afloat,  —  afloat  truly,  and 
drifting  on  the  surface  of  the  age,  for  they  have 
no  root  within  its  heart  and  life,  such,  I  mean, 
as  tend  to  minimize  the  strength  and  depth  and 
vitality  of  sin.  Whether  they  choose  to  repre 
sent  it  as  a  lower  undeveloped  form  of  good,  a 
thing  transmutable,  with  no  essence  of  its  own, 
or  as  being  merely  the  want  of  balance  and 
proportion,  a  question  of  too  much  or  too  little 


TWO  FRIENDS.  163 

in  the  poising  of  man's  nature,  only  needing 
readjustment,  they  have  but  one~  practical 
effect,  and  that  is,  to  eat  the  heart  out  of  our 
whole  spiritual  life  ;  to  make  even  the  life  of 
Christ,  the  truest  life  that  has  ever  lived,  to 
make  even  his  dying,  a  sort  of  drama.  If  there 
is  no  reality  in  sin,  what  becomes  of  the  deep 
reality  of  sacrifice  ?  To  what  need  was  this 
great  cost? 

"  And  what  is  there  in  Scripture  which  fa 
vors  the  idea  of  any  gradual  absorption  of  evil  ? 
Isaiah,  a  book  stored  with  evangelic  comfort, 
concludes  with  a  denunciation  on  this  point, 
the  awfulness  of  which  cannot  be  surpassed  by 
human  language  ;  and  is  there  not  something 
deeply  significant  in  a  fact  which  the  so-called 
adherents  of  '  Jesus,  not  Paul,'  would  do  well 
to  consider,  that  it  is  from  our  Lord's  own  lips 
(and  this,  I  think,  without  a  solitary  exception) 
that  the  severest  warnings  of  future  judgment 
fall.  He  it  is,  and  not  any  one  apostle,  who 
speaks  of  the  fire  unquenchable,  the  worm  that 
never  dies  ;  he  who  describes,  under  many  si 
militudes,  the  final  separation  between  the  good 


164  TWO  FRIENDS. 

and  evil,  and  the  utter  rejection  of  the  latter. 
Good  and  evil  are  antagonistic  independent 
powers,  separate  from  the  beginning,  separate 
even  unto  the  end.  What  communion  hath 
Christ  with  Belial  ?  what  fellowship  hath  light 
with  darkness  ?  Milton  has  taught  us  to  look 
upon  the  Devil  as  a  fallen  angel,  a  being  origi 
nally  good ;  yet  we  are  told  by  St.  John,  and 
.by  One  greater  than  he,  that  he  was  a  liar  and 
a  murderer  from  the  beginning.  This  is  a  sub 
ject  which  surely  does  not  invite  to  a  vague 
sentimentalism.  Who  can  trace  the  history  of 
the  past  ?  who  can  read  the  history  of  the  pres 
ent  ?  who,  in  other  words,  can  take  up  a  news 
paper  and  refuse  to  believe  in  the  existence  of 
a  dark  kingdom  of  fraud,  and  cruelty,  and  un 
speakable  iniquity  underlying  the  superficial 
prosperity  of  our  daily  life  ;  a  kingdom  that 
draws  its  strength  and  allurement  from  a  spir 
itual  source,  a  kingdom  that  hath  foundations,  — 
foundations  which  are  being  continually  more 
and  more  laid  bare  by  the  Light  which  shall  at 
last  triumph  over  them,  as  completely  as  the 
glory  of  the  sunshine  now  fills  every  nook  and 


TWO  FRIENDS.  165 

crevice  of  some  giant  ruin  that  once  resounded 
to  the  shout  of  '  Ave  Caesar,  morituri  ~te  sala- 
tant:  " 

"  A  cry,"  said  Philip,  "  which,  translated 
into  a  purer  language,  has  now  become  the 
watchword  of  the  soldier  and  servant  of  Christ. 
It  seems  to  me  that  in  no  other  age  of  the 
world  has  the  attraction  of  the  Cross  been  so 
deeply  felt  as  it  is  in  this,  —  perhaps  because  it 
has  been  never  so  much  needed  as  it  is  now  to 
explain  the  dark  parables  of  nature  ;  the  griev 
ous  contradictions  of  life.  It  is  certain  that  the 
primitive  Church,  though  it  lived  beneath  its 
shadow,  clasped  it  less  closely  to  the  heart  than 
we  do.  Simplicity  and  cheerfulness  are  the 
leading  characteristics  of  the  pictures  in  the 
Catacombs.  It  is  remarkable  that  the  Cross 
does  not  appear  in  them,  nor  any  figure  that 
tends  to  show  a  strong  consciousness  of  sin, 
and  the  corresponding  sense  of  alienation  from 
God.  Here  we  have  Christ,  the  King,  the 
good  Shepherd,  ever  with  his  book,  in  the  midst 
of  his  faithful  ones  in  earth  and  heaven,  be 
tween  which  two  places  there  is  no  division 


166  TWO  FRIENDS. 

apparent  except  that  of  Jordan,  —  for  so  is 
death  represented,  —  a  slender,  easily-crossed 
stream,  the  opposite  banks  distinguishable  by 
the  thorns  and  snares  on  one  side,  and  the 
ever-blooming  flowers  on  the  other.  The  two 
pervading,  continually  recurring  ideas  are  those 
of  the  guardianship  of  Christ,  '  Ego  sum  pastor 
bonus,'  and  of  the  Resurrection,  brought  out 
over  and  again  under  the  favorite  type  of 
Jonah.  This  infant,  blood-baptized  Church, 
deeply  suffering,  was  not,  it  seems,  so  deeply 
sorrowing  as  ours ;  it  did  not  know  our  in 
tellectual  sadness,  our  doubts,  our  weariness, 
our  worldliness,  our  strifes  among  brethren. 
The  star  Wormwood  had  not  then  fallen, 
making  all  the  waters  of  the  earth  bitter." 

"And  yet,"  I  said,  "were  they  to  become 
exceeding  bitter,  so  that  no  man  could  drink 
them,  the  Lord  hath  showed  us  a  Tree." 

"  Beneath  thy  Cross  I  stand, 

Jesus,  my  Saviour,  turn  and  look  on  me ! 
0,  who  are  these  that,  one  on  either  hand, 
Are  crucified  with  thee  ? 

"  The  one  that  turns  away 

With  sullen,  scoffing  lip,  and  one  whose  eyes 


TWO  FRIENDS.  167 

Close  o'er  the  words,  '  Yet  shalt  thon  be  this  day 
With  me  in  Paradise.'  .„ 

"  Here  would  I  fain  behold 

This  twofold  mystery,  Love's  battle  won, 
Its  warfare  ended,  and  its  ransom  told, 
Its  conquest  but  begun ! 

"  I  say  not  to  thee  now, 

Come  from  the  Cross  and  then  will  I  believe ; 
0,  lift  me  up  to  thee,  and  teach  me  how 
To  love  and  how  to  grieve. 

"  I  tracked  thy  footsteps  long ; 

For  where  thou  wert,  there  would  thy  servant  be ; 
But  now,  methought  the  silence,  now  the  throng, 
Would  part  me  still  from  thee. 

"  I  sought  thee  'mid  the  leaves, 

I  found  thee  on  the  dry  and  blasted  tree; 
I  saw  thee  not  until  I  saw  the  thieves 
There  crucified  with  thee !  " 


Cambridge  :    Stereotyped  and  Printed  by  Welch,  Bigelow,  &  Co. 


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